Dancing with Lightning
by BDragonXO
Summary: "Didn't anyone tell you that playing with fire was bad" he asked leaning in closer to me, "Yeah, but they didn't say anything about dancing with lightning" I said tracing my finger over his scar. Warning!(Laxus x BoyOC pairing) don't like, then don't read!
1. Chapter 1

And welcome to another Fairy Tail story by BDragonXO! (Cheers and claps) But before I do anything I would like to give a big shout out to** Feari Teiru :). **This chick/dude can write they ass off and he/she was gracious enough and allowed me the use of the gist of their owe so popular story **Smokin' Hot** (Which if you haven't read then I suggest you do). And after I read the story another one just popped into my head and so (with permission) I went ahead and decided to write this story. Keep in mind that this is a Laxus x boy story so If you don't like **then don't freaking READ!** (Why a Laxus x boy, story BDragonXO?) Good question! I decided that I wanted a challenge and decided to re write this story to accommodate my thirst for a challenge but enough talking.

On with the story!

* * *

Chapter 1

As the music comes to an end, the dancing couple gives their final bow and walk off the stage as the audience gives a grand applause.

I glanced from behind the curtains and look into the audience, I see my dancing instructor and a bunch other officials from my school in the audience, they looked tense and nervous and personally at this point in time, I didn't blame them.

"_If anyone should be nervous it's me"_ I thought as I breathed in heavily

The intercom buzzed and a man's voice ranged for it "The next group to perform in the National Eurythmic Dance Regional are the: Sterling Red Wolfs

A mix group of teenage boys and girls wearing bright red letter men jackets with shimmering silver lining take the stage. A peach skinned bright-blond girl, wearing a bright red tutu and a silver sequined jacket with a detailed "E" over her right breast takes the center stage. She glances in my direction and gives me a smug smile.

I clench my fist to the point that I thought that I might draw blood, I wasn't going to let her get to me, I had made my decision and was going to stick by it, even if it was the craziest and stupidest decision that I had ever made in the eighteen years of my life.

Their music starts with the sound of a howling woof and all of the performers on stage start howling along with it, everyone except the girl that is. The beat suddenly drops and flux dub-step wave flutters through the speaker as the teens starting moving in a position around the girl who dips her head and starts shrugging her shoulder to the beat. The team moves around the girl with a series of turns and quick movements as the girl starts to get more into the rhythm, the dancers suddenly stop moving as they form two straight lines, the girl struts her way into the front and looks out into the crowd as if staring them down, which she technically was because the stage was higher than audience but whatever...

She jumps and starts twirling with the sound of the music and suddenly dips her shoulders in a fast beat motion, she does three perfect pirouettes before leaning back and throwing her leg straight into the air, while popping her hips. Her performance was a mix of perfectly poise ballet with a crisp hip-hop flow, even though I can't stand any of those stuck up snobs from Sterling, I had to admit that they were good, she was good, and the crowd seemed to agree with me with the amount of noise that they were making.

"What a bunch of pretentious bull" a bored voice said from behind me

I jumped about ten feet in my skin and suddenly turned my head around to face my pink haired friend, Chelia.

"Chelia!" I suddenly shrieked placing my hand over my fast beating heart "What are you doing here?" I yelled at her

"I'd figured I would find you here, and…." She shyly started shuffling her feet and stared down at the ground. After finally catching my breath I started to look her over, her amaranth hair wasn't in their normal pigtails but was evenly combed out, she was wearing heavy colored make up with a strapless black dress with a pair of black combat boots.

"You were right" she whispered to me in a soft voice "About everything" she looked up at me with tears welling up in her eyes, I softly smiled at her and engulfed her in a big hug, she sniffled into my shoulder and wiped the tears out of her eyes when I let her go

"Stupid boys" she huffed and stomped her foot "As soon as I get to the concert, they go and ditch me and all because…" she was suddenly silenced when a huge explosion comes from the stage, we turn to see a series of light fireworks go off and give the stage a dazzling glow, the dancers give their last cheer and the crowd just goes nuts! The judges look impressed and my school officials suddenly takes out a napkin from his breast pocket and wipes the sweet off his brow.

The Red Wolfs walk off stage and up to me and Chelia. They all start giving up glares and snickers (and not the chocolate kind). The girl was the first one to speak up…

"Well, well, well, what do we have here?" she walks to the front of the pack and glares us down, but more so me.

"If it isn't Tomoyashi Brackendale and, Chelly was it" she sneered

"Chelia" she corrected with a glare

"Whatever" she rolls her eyes and turns her attention back to me "What did you think of our performance, Tomo?"

"It was good, Eyota, very nice" I replied as I swallowed the lump in my throat

"Oh thank you, but I'm sure you and your crew will do…oops" she placed her hand over her mouth in a mocking fashion "I'm sorry, I forgot" she started giggling and the rest of her team soon followed

"Tomo, can do just fine without a group or a flashy performance" Chelia jumped forward and I outstretched my hand to stop her, she looked up at my with a face full of shock and I only shook my head at her and she backed down.

"I'm so sure" she sneered "See Tomo, if you would have just taken me up on my offer then this" she gestured at her whole team "Would be all ours"

"More like, you wanted me to be your back up to make you look better" I glared at her and she gave me a sickened look that soon turned to a crocked smile and shrugged

"Every pack needs an Alpha leader and ever leader needs a right hand man" she placed her hands on her hip and stared me up and down "But a little humiliation should teach you better"

The air around us was so thick they you could have psychically cut it, it wasn't until the intercom rang that all of our attention was converted

"The National Eurythmic Dance Regionals will commence after a fifthteen minute intermission" the intercom buzzed for a minute before clicking off

"Looks like you've got some time before you go on, try not to choke" Eyota started making gagging sounds while her followers did the same, she smiled at me when a boy with short blond hair walks up behind her and placed his hand on her shoulder

"Eyota, we should be going" he said in a monotone voice. She glared up at him and smacked his hand off her shoulder before snapping her fingers and walking off with her group in tow. The boy stood their looking back and forth between me and Chelia, but mostly Chelia. She glared at the boy with a look of pure hatred, if looks could kill then he would have surely been died by now.

He opened his mouth to say something but closed it before hanging his head low, "Good luck" he said in a soft voice before jogging to catch up with his team

I side glance at Chelia and could see that she was more hurt then angry at this moment, I turn back around and look back into the audience to see a couple of people get up and walk out of the room, my dance instructor sat with a look of pure…well, I don't know, it was like a combination of constipation with pride, I could never really tell what that lady was thinking by her facial expressions, they were always the weirdest combination of things.

"Tomo" Chelia called out to me and I crook my neck to look back at her

"Yeah"

"Are you sure that you want to do this" she asked in a caring but doubtful tone

"Well" I sigh "It's too late to back down now"

"Of course it's not" she gushed out and grabbed my arm and started dragging me to the back emergency door "I'll just push you out and say you "went missing" she smiled crookedly

"As much as I would love to be the next segment of sixty minutes, I would prefer to go through with this outrageous idea" I tugged my arm from Chelia and give her a big smile

"At least, I'll prove something to myself" I stared sadly at the ground, after everything that had conspired over the last couple of months, there was something in me that told me that if I didn't go through with this, then I would never be able to forgive myself.

"Prove what!" she shrieked at my and stomped her foot

I shrugged "I don't know, but I'll let you know when I figure it out" I give her a big goofy smile and she narrows her eyes at me and huffs before stomping off into the back dressing room.

"Wait for me!" I laughed and started jogging to catch up with her, the yellow gem necklace around my neck jingled left and right as I ran and I smiled at the happy memory of when I got it.

"_And to think, this all started because of Homecoming!"_

* * *

There is much more to come!

Please R&R


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2:

_6 Months Prior to the events that proceeded this chapter (Mouth full much?)_

The bright sun beamed into the peach colored 2 story house on the edge of a corner in a neighborhood. The sun rays were more particularly directed onto the second floor windows of said house. The room was a dark shade of blue with different posters of sea animals and a calendar with large X over the preceding dates. Picture frames lined the small work table in the corner, different shots of miscellanies moments captured into 6x8 frames, mainly moments between a boy and a girl. A large queen sized mattress in the middle of the room took up much of the space

The sound of an alarm going off rang thought the room and a figure could be heard shuffling from under the covers of the bed. A hand out stretched from under the cover and smashed the clock causing the beeping to stop. After another moment, another alarm from the opposite side of the bed begins to ring and a tired groan comes from the bed as another hand outstretched slams the other clock. Silent takes over the room once again before another small beeping comes from the table in the other corner of the room.

The figures begins to slowly shuffle in the bed until the covers flew up and a teenage boy begins to slowly sit up. The teen's midnight blue hair was completely disheveled and stuck out in all direction with a bad case of bed head. His stretched his arms out and a yawn escaped his mouth as he tiredly looked at the time

6:45

"_Time to get up" _he though as he stretched once more and swing his feet on the side of the bed and walked over to his dresser to silence the beeping coming from his phone

"_So annoying"_ he thought as he walked into his bathroom with another yawn

**Tomo's POV**

As I walked into my bathroom I stopped to look at myself in the mirror and laughed.

"I look awful" I said chuckling to myself

After doing the one thing that most boys do in the morning I began my usual morning routine which consisted of brushing my teeth, brush then tying up my hair into a ponytail (My hair reached about my mid back when undone) and getting my mom, dad, and little brother up before making breakfast. (Seems like a lot I know)

I walked out into the hallway and passed my parents' bedroom and into my little brother, Juno's room. Over the years I learned different ways to get Juno to get out of his bed with little to no fight, it was getting my parents up without getting cut was the issue.

"Juno" I called out as I knocked and opened the door. His small room was dark but I could make out the make out the shapes of his toy cars and rockets that lined over the floor. I carefully tip-toed over the toy minefield not wanting to break them or hurt myself. After reaching his bed (and giving myself a pat on the back) I started to shake his little body

"Juno, Juno it's time to get up"

He stirred a little and groaned before turning on his other side

"Five more minutes" he said half asleep

"_Here we go"_ I chuckled to myself

"Fine" I said as I started to walk away "I'll just eat all the pancakes by myself, then"

At the mention of food, Juno's little body sat straight up and he started rubbing the sleep from his eyes quickly

"I'm up" he said trying to sound awake

I chuckled "Good, wash up and get dress and come down stairs" I placed my foot in front of me and suddenly felt the sensation of hard metal. I looked down and saw one of his rocket robots under my foot. "And pick up your toys too" I said rolling my foot so that the robot went behind me. I closed the door to his room and braced myself before walking over to my parent's door. I pushed the door open and it creaked loudly, I shuddered at the sound but pushed it all the way open. The room was bigger than both mine and Juno's, I quietly walked over to the nearest window and the wooden floor creaked with each step I took. My dad's body shook softly and I held my breath, he muttered something in his sleep before dozing back off, I breathed a sigh of relief. I quickly made my way over to their window and with a sudden move, pushed the curtains open letting in a large amount of sunlight. Both my parents bodies shook at the sudden intrusion of bright light, they both started stirring and groaning. My dad sat up and opened his eyes half way and stared at me, he squinted his eyes and felt on the table for his glasses.

I quickly moved over to his side table and picked the glasses up and placed them in his hand before heading toward the door

"Morning" I yelled as I quickly escaped the room "Breakfast will be ready in a minute" I said as I closed the door. I placed my back against their door and breathed a breath of relief

"_That never gets easier" _I thought to myself as I walked back into my room. I noticed that the text message light on my phone was blinking and figured that it could only be one person. I walked over and after putting in my screen lock password, checked my message:

_6:55_

_Tomo! Don't forget to wear something yellow today!_

_Chelia_

_Why?_ I text back (I'm one of those, spell everything out type of texter)

_6:56_

_For spirit day silly :)_

_Chelia_

I blinked at the message and walked over to my calendar. I dragged my finger across the dates and landed on today's and shivered at the remembrance of what this week was, written in small red letters spelled out the phrase:

_Homecoming week_

"Ugh, why did I even write that down" I asked aloud and threw my hand up in the air

Every day of Homecoming week, the school does something to try and get all the students and community pumped up. It wasn't that I didn't like my school or that I didn't have school spirit, it was just… well, you'll see what I'm talking about later. I groan and plug my phone into the wall charger before closing the door to my bathroom behind me

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOX

On the other side of a city called Magnolia, an apartment complex stands. The complex itself isn't what's most important but more exactly, what's behind door 7C was. This particular room was occupied by one, Laxus Drayer, who even though had his own very nicely furnished home, would occasionally come to this apartment to "entertain" one of his guest. Little did Laxus know that he was soon going to make one of the biggest mistakes of his life.

The sound of a cell phone ringing sounded throughout the small room as a muscular man sits up and pushes the answer button.

"What" he groaned in an annoyed voice

"Laxus" the voice gargled on the other side "Where are you?"

"In my fucking skin, why Evergreen?" he snapped angrily

"Well excuse me" the voice said in a snarky tone "I need a ride, can you come get me?"

The man groaned and sat up while scratching his yellow spikey hair

"Yeah, just give me a minute"

"Thanks, talk to you later" the voice sang and then hung up

**Laxus POV**

"_So annoying_" he muttered as he closed the phone and tossed it on the floor. He could feel the after effects of the alcohol slowly start filling up my body, it felt like his brain was going to split apart. He leaned back and tried to clear his cloudy mind when a figure next to him starts shuffling. He looked down to see a dirty blond woman sleeping next to him, she turns on her other side and that's when he noticed that she was completely bare

"Oh, right" he let out a yawn and pulled the covers off his body

He walk into the bathroom and take a piss before going into his medicine cabinet looking for something to help his aching headache. He found the last aspirin and choked it down with some sink water before jumping into the shower. As the warm water ran down his body and relax his tired muscles, he started to feel the aspirin take effect. He began to wonder about his job but remembered making a bet with that idiot, Gajeel, about who could drink the most in ten minutes and of course he won. He went as far as to bet that he would take over the early morning shift at the firehouse

"Idiot" Laxus chucked at the memory of Gajeel dropping like the lightweight he was

As the warm water started to run out, he turned the shower off and watched as the water went down the drain. He stepped out grabbed a towel to dry himself, before putting on the same clothes from the other day, a sleeveless tight purple shirt with tight black jeans.

He walked back into the room and sat on the bed and began to put on his shoes when a felt pair of arms wrap around him

"Morning" the woman said in a seductively sleepy voice as she ran her hand over his abs

Laxus didn't reply or even acknowledge her; he continued to grab his phone and car keys and stuffed them into his pockets. He stood up but felt her grab at his wrist. He turned to face her and noticed the look of lust in her eyes and sighed, He had always hated that after one night, women always tried to cling to him, that's why he was hoping she would still be sleep when he left.

"Why don't we get some breakfast or maybe" she started rubbing his groin and licking her lips seductively "we could stay in all day"

"As much as I would love to do that" he said slapping her hand away "I don't sleep with the same person twice" The look in her eyes turned from one of lust to one of shock and confusion

"Wh-What do you mean?" she said as used the sheets to cover her body

"There's no food in the freezer, but help yourself to anything else" Ignoring her question, he took out his wallet and tossed a couple of dollars on the bed, her face turned from confused the angry

"Is that what you think I am, some cheap prostitute!" she started yelling and he sighed

"Keep your voice down, I don't want to deal with neighbors again" he cringed digging into his ear and walking toward the door

"Wait" she yelled "You leave, and I'll call rape" she threatend

"_She's one of "those" types" _He chuckled and turned back to look at her. Her blond hair was sticking up and her face was completely red. Her eyes were filled a combination of both hatred and fear and Laxus, only chuckled _"I sure know how to pick em"_

"And tell them what, you flirted with some guy and slept with him" She grinded her teeth together "To be honest, I don't remember much about last night so it doesn't really matter to me what you do" he turned around and headed for the door again

"You're making the biggest mistake of your life" she said in a meaning voice "Don't you know who I am?"

"Not really" he said opening the door and closing before she started to scream

Laxus walked down the hallway and into the elevator around the corner from the room. As the lights on the elevator flashed he thought back to the chick in the room, there was nothing in that apartment for her to use against him and if he got a dime for every time a woman that threatened to call rape, well… let's just say he's be very wealthy. He learned that women will do or say whatever they can to keep their appearance. As the elevator dinged and the doors slid open, Laxus walked out with his hands deep in his pockets, as he passed the lot, he noticed the old lady that lives on the top floor and she was caring a large bag that seemed to be fertilizer. She looked like she was having a hard time carrying it and when he passed her; He could tell that she was out of breath.

Laxus stopped and walked back to the old woman and took the bag from her hands, she looked up at him with a look of shock on her face as he hauled the bag over his shoulder with ease. He looked down and saw that she was beaming up. They walked into the elevator together and pushed the button for the top floor. After reaching her door, Laxus had wait for the woman's bony fingers as she tried to get the key into the hole.

"_No one better see me" _he thought

After what felt like forever she opened the door and they walked in

"Were do you want this?"

"Oh, just put it over their" she said pointing at the table

After walking and placing the bag on the table, he turned to walk away before her frail voice rang out

"Thank you, you're a very kind man" she said

"No problem" he didn't bother to turn around as he walked out the door. After reaching the ground floor, where his yellow Ferrari 458 was parked. Even, Laxus, would admit it was more of a status symbol than anything else. Some people wish they could even touch something this great, sleek paint, padded seats, retractable hood.

He unlocked the door and adjusted the mirror, I looked at my reflection and snickered

"_I'm not kind, I'm an asshole and I know it"_ he chuckled before pulling out of the garage

XOXOXOXOXOXOXXO

I hop down the stairs wearing a button up yellow shirt and blue jeans with my red adidas high tops. I enter the kitchen and turn the stove burner's on before grabbing the ingredients for pancake's and putting a fresh filter into the coffee machine, my parents need their coffee or things..get…ugly

I crack opened two eggs into the bowl and slowly whisk it together with flour, sugar, and milk. Keep in mind that I'm no Mather Stuart or Rachel Ray, but over the years I've been able to hone my culinary skills into a moderate meal.

After flipping out about twenty pancakes, I add some bacon to the pan and watch as it begins to sizzle and crisp, I reach over into the refrigerator and pull out the carton of orange juice and pour it into four different glasses and place them on the table. I take the bacon out and replace it with some eggs that I'm going to scramble, I take some bread out and place it into the toaster and then reach over and start scrambling the eggs. After their churned into little bits I add them to a plate and place that on the table when the timer on the toaster rings and the bread pops up golden brown. I grab the toast and slather some butter on the before placing it on the table. I take a step back and admire my work before looking down at my phone:

7:15

"Okay, I've got about two minutes" I sit in my chair at the dining room table, place my phone on the table and take in a deep breath and close my eyes. I wasn't praying if that's what you think, it's just that this is probably the only time that I'll ever get to myself and I like to take as much of the silence that I can. After that, I begin my countdown

10….

9….

8…

The sound of shuffling feet could be heard coming from upstairs

7…

6…

5…

Feet begin to hardly thump against the floor as the sound of water running, glass chiming, and the clocks ticking begin to take hold

4…

3…

2…

I clench my face as the sounds begin to get louder and feet bustle down the stairs in a fast motion

And, 1…

"Morning Tomo!" Juno yells as he rushes over to the table and quickly climbs into his seat

I let out the breath and open my eyes and greeted my family with a crooked smile

**Laxus POV**

As he came to another red lights, the wheels creaked as it slowed slows down and rocked back and forth. Laxus leaned back in his seat and punched the speed dial button for Evergreen. It rang for a minute before she picked up

"Hello" Evergreen's voice gargled on the side "Laxus?"

"Yeah, where am I supposed to pick you up from?"

There was silence for a moment before she answered "The jail house" she said in an irritated voice

Laxus pulled the phone from his ear and gave it a confused look before speaking "Why?"

The static on the line flickered "Don't worry about!" Evergreen screeched making Laxus pull the phone from his ear "Just get here soon"

"_Umm, mam_" a man's voice echoed in the background "_If you could please lower your voice_"

"Hey, what did I say, don't touch me" she screeched at the man

"_Mam, if you could please"_ the man pleaded

Some shuffling could be heard "I promise you that if you lay one finger on me" she threatend the man "Laxus? Are you still there?"

"Uh-huh" he replied chuckling

"Good, meet me here and make it" there was some more shuffling before a deep gruff voice echoed out

"_Miss, you're making a lot of noise_"

"I will make as much noise as long as" there was some more shuffling and then Evergreen could be heard screaming

"Hey! Didn't I say don't touch me" she yelled "Put me down this instant!" Laxus! Get here now!" she last yelled before hanging up the phone

Laxus pulled his phone from his ear and looked at it before chucking it into the passenger seat.

"I should really reconsider who I hang around" he thought as the stoplight turned green and his car speed off to pick up his friend.

**Tomo POV**

"So" Juno asked through a mouthful of food "Will you pick me up from school, Tomo?"

"Juno, please don't speak with your mouthful" My mom said as she applied her makeup

Juno swallowed the food in his mouth with a swift gulp and downed his juice

I chuckled at his antics and speared another piece of the breakfast "I might be able to but I have dance practice after school" as finished as I placed the food in my mouth

My father scoffed and flattened out the newspaper as he took another sip of his coffee.

I looked over to where my father was sitting and quietly took another bite of my food. If you haven't already guessed then let me tell you, my father was never too keen on the idea of me dancing. He always had this dream of me becoming a banker like him, he was known throughout Magnolia as one of the best accountants in the area. Of course, when I decide tells him that I would rather dance them follow in his footsteps, well… You can kind of guess the rest

As in awkward silence rang out room my phone suddenly buzzed catching my attention. I picked it up and look at the screen and saw that it was the reminder that the bus was going to be coming soon. I quickly downed the rest of my breakfast, grabbed my backpack and my phone and headed for the door.

I yelled a silent goodbye before slamming the door behind me

* * *

Please R&R Honestly


	3. Chapter 3

This is like the fastest that I have ever updated one of my stories, But I've been thinking about this story for a while and am inspired!

So, on with the next chapter

* * *

Chapter 3:

The wheels to Laxus car screeched as he came to a stop in front of the Magnolia Prison center. He rested his elbow on top of the steering wheel and glanced at his phone, checking to see if Evergreen had contacted him again, which apparently, she hadn't

As if hearing his inner thoughts, Evergreen busted through the doors looking particularly livid. She slung her black purse over her shoulder and fumed her way down the stairs, she noticed Laxus's car and slumped her shoulder before quickening her pace

"Bout time you got here" she sneered as Laxus pushed the passenger door open letting her enter

"Yeah, nice to see you to" he chuckled as she slammed the door close and buckled her seat belt as Laxus sped off

Evergreen rummaged through her purse and took out a cigarette and lighter, as she sparked the light making it came to life, she put the opposite end of the cigarette in her mouth and lit the other end before inhaling a big whiff

"I thought you quit those" Laxus said keeping his attention on the road

Evergreen side glanced at him in annoyance before exhaling slowly, making the gray mist swirl around in the air before dissipating

"Shut up" she said taking another whiff and exhaling "I've had a long day"

Some of the mist floated over to Laxus's side making him involuntarily inhale and wheeze for a moment

"*cough* at least *cough**cough* let a window down. Dealing with that stuff at work is enough"

Evergreen groaned and pushed the button making the window slide down slightly, she blew the rest of the smoke out the window.

"We'll excuse me, " she sneered "But us normal folk don't get off by sprinkling water on idiot mistakes" she said flicking the bud out the window before closing it

"Hey! Did you make sure that it was completely out before you tossed it?" Laxus asked looking in the front mirror at the location Evergreen had just tossed the cigarette in

Evergeen rolled her eyes and took a half empty water bottle from her purse and poured the rest of the contents out the window before tossing the actual bottle itself

"There" she said wiping her hand on her stockings "Problem solved"

Laxus shook his head and swore that if he got a call later on for a forest fire, then he was going to make Evergreen come with him. Erza had made everyone in the office take a mandatory fire hazard assessment quiz and if you failed below the set standard then you would have to take it again and again until she was sure that you remembered. There wasn't any doubt that a certain pink haired man had to take the test over ten times.

Even though he wasn't the best at taking test himself, some of the questions where just basic knowledge.

"Anyway" Laxus started "Why where you arrested this time?" he said smirking a little

Evergreen groaned and leaned her head back against the head rest. She crossed her legs together and pucker her lips up and gave Laxus a seductive look.

Laxus side glanced at his friend while simultaneously having his eyes on the road, gave her a look of complete confusion.

"What the hell, are you doing?" he asked looking back and forth from the road to her

"This" she said gesturing to her facial structure "Was me, minding my own business when this cute guy happened to walk by, so I decided to try and talk to him; I walked over and started being the cute and lively person that I am"

"So you basically threw yourself at him?"

"Anyway" she said hissing "I walked over to the man and started putting on the charm but then he started to get all defensive taking about how he had a wife, and I'm like really?" I mean come on, I'm" she said pointing to herself "Smoking Hot" (see what I did there)

Laxus rolled his eyes and chuckled "If you say so, then what happened?"

Evergreen's face twisted like she had a sour taste in her mouth "And then the jerk started screaming for help and that's when the police officer showed up and ,get this; The jerk had the nerve to say that I was a prostitute trying to sleep with him!" she gasped

Laxus stomped on the brake making the car come to a hard stop and rock back and forth. Laxus layed his forehead and on steering wheel and let out a loud whooping laugh. He leaned back and slumped in his seat and placed his hand on his head before continuing his laughing fit

"Shut up, what the hell is so funny?!" Evergreen blushed

Laxus laughing fit soon died down to a chuckle here and there, but every time that he would look at Evergreen, they would start up again

"What's not funny about that" he said through gasps "Man, this is hilarious" he wiped at tear away from his eye

"Whatever" she leaning back into her seat "But anyway, what happened with that tramp that you left with last night"

"Oh, her" he chuckled as he put the car into the corrective gear and sped off again "I left her at back at the apartment" he shrugged

Evergreen chuckled "You never seem to impress, me" she said admiring her nails "One of these days, you're going to mess with the work girl and end up, six feet under"

"Pshh, whatever" Laxus brushed it off "If they didn't make it so easy to sleep with them then it's not my fault"

"Whatever, if you say so"

Laxus had knew what people had said about him behind his back, that he was an ass hole and that he only used women for sex but that really wasn't his problem. If someone didn't want to do something then all they had to do was say something, heck even he knew his limit and would decline the offer when it was in his best interest, but it never seemed to come to that. Besides, it wasn't like anyone could stop him from being himself, he would like to see someone try

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

I believe that there is something to be said about public transportation. Like for instance, I believe that there should be a designated section where people with common sense, could sit with their alike peers and that people with-out sense, would sit behind a sound proof glass so that they could be with the other people that blast there music, for no good reasons or those that just happen to have that strange smell.

The public bus isn't the best type of transportation in the world, but it's better than taking the school bus and it sure as heck beats riding with my mom or dad and sitting in the car with an eerie awkwardness around us.

The only thing that was saving me, was that the school gave out free bus passes to any "in-need" students that had commuting trouble, and after a very convincing story and a couple of fake tears shed here and there, I was able to secure my one without a problem. Not a lot of people use them anyway because, and I quote _"It's beneath them"_

Well, there loss is my gain I say

The bus ran into what felt like a pot hole and dipped sharply making the bus lean over to the right and the people standing to fall and safely land into the laps of the people that where unfortunately under them, fortunately after all of these years catching the bus, I've come to learn the rules and trades or in laymen's term "The do's and don'ts" of public transportation. And on that list is:

Rule 5 of 10: When riding a public transportation vehicle, seating is crucial. Never! sit beside a standing citizen unless you want to become a human pillow. Never! sit beside someone when they get off work or else, 1. You'll go home covered in someone else's sweat or 2. You'll have to listen to someone rant on and on about the oppression that they have to deal with at work.

The bus driver came onto the intercom and announced the next stop, which just happened to be mine. I grabbed my backpack and stealthy checked my surroundings to make sure that I wasn't forgetting something, because:

Rule 3 of 10: When you lose something on a public transportation vehicle, there is a five out of ten (that's fifty percent for you geniuses or half) chance that you will get it back

The bus stopped and the driver pushed that button that makes the bus get shorter and I hopped off and started my walk. My school was a twenty minute walk from the nearest bus stop. I attended the Magnolia School of Performing Arts for the Gifted or MPA for short. But unlike most performing arts school we don't have to wear a uniform (Thank god!) But, unlike other performing arts school, we have…

The sound of loud music echoed out as a bright pink convertible came zooming down the road. It was as if time stood still for a moment as I watched it fly be, for in that small four seater vehicle where five of the most unbearably, cocky, self-absorbed S.O.B's that even Mariah Carey would have to stop looking at her reflection for a minute and take a look

Sting Eucliffe, not the baddest guy in bunch but get him together with his other group of friends and things get sour real quick. He's the starting Power Forward for the Magnolia Basketball team and is pretty much a team player, but his ego can go to his head real quick.

Rogue Cheney, the quiet one of the bunch but quiet doesn't always mean shy. He doesn't play a sport but he's been Sting's best friend since like forever. He has a kind side to him but get on his bad side and well…

The one driving was Sorano aka Angel, she's like the Regina George of Magnolia, pretty to look at but turn your back on her for a second and BAM! Stab in the back central, she's doesn't do anything because her parents are rich enough to afford every plastic surgery that she needs to make her outside better than her inside. She's so perfect, hence the name "Angel" meaning she can do no wrong (But call her by her real name and see what happens) She part of the school cheer leading program (of course)

Next is, Andrew Elxis…. Let's not talk about him, he's on the football team, let's leave it at that

Anyway, last but not least is Zancrow, he's basically the offspring of what a drug dealer and a psycho killer would be like if they reproduced. If his long and unruly hair or dark beady eyes aren't enough to scare you, then that psychotic grin he spreads across his face will make you have nightmare. He does what he wants, when he wants it or else he goes on a rampage. Last year, he and the gym teacher got into a fist fight and he took a pocket knife out and stabbed the guy! The school board was so scared of him that they only had him suspended and he came back like nothing happened. The school placed him on the football team so that he would have something extracurricular to burn all his "constructive energy" as the councilor would say. Basically, he's so psychotic that no one ever really bother's with him. And you know what the best part about all is of that is?

A high pierced whistle cut me from my inner monologue and I looked up to see Zancrow, standing up in the car, flicking my off while laughing, "Loser"

He's made it his personal goal to terrorize me at every corner, whither it be tripping me in the hall or putting some decapitated animal head in my locker (Luckily its only been small things) or announcing on the school intercom that I have some sort of highly contagious disease, so, yeah.

The car zoomed out of my line of sight and I gave a silent thanks to the grand almighty beings above.

The things that made MPA one of the most renowned school was the main fact that it was both a performing arts academy that also had a sports program. Even though the school itself was good, it was the fact that some people thought that they were better than others was the main problem. On the outside looking in, people saw the polished and refined place that it was supposed to be, but on the inside things are a lot different.

Listen to me ramble on about the bad things, MPA is a great place were diverse people can come and get a good educational opportunity, that will enhance their chances of becoming a productive member of society; Eww, I sound like the principle when I do that

Basically, it's high school in a nutshell, and I'm so glad that this was my last year and that in a few short month's I won't have to worry about putting up with any of these nut cases again

I make the next right and see the front of the school come into view, the gate with the school initials, _MPA, _are crafted in gold and red and is the first thing that you see when you pass down the road, The office is on the far right of the entrance and around the corner of that is the library but in the morning it's the snooze room for the people that get to school crazy early.

I walk into the courtyard where different cliques took their normal spots, it was like this, tech savvy and nerds sit in the back near the trees, actors and singers sit underneath the shaded part of the courtyard while the jocks/cheerleader and party animals sit dead center so that they can be as loud and obnoxious as they want and everyone can see them, artist tend to always be in the art room because it's open all day and free to anyone (school wise) to use. Gymnastic people tend to use the seats that are the closest to the lunchroom, so there first in line. The dancers (that would be my group) would always arrive and diverse themselves to other group (What can I say, we're social creatures) but I always have to make a trip to my locker to lighten my load (No pun intended)

I entered the foreign language department building, where my locker was located. This building is the perfect place to have a locker because it's the only building that has working A/C all school year, the others die out about the same time every year so having my locker here is definitely a plus. The only minus, is that when the professor's pass me, they greet me all in different languages, I've learned to say "goodbye" in Spanish, Japanese, French, Korean, and Russian. How that with help me in the future I'll never know, but it's a skill.

I reached my locker, 23F, and started entering my combination

"36 right – 14 left – and" I entered the last combination and opened it slowly and peeked inside to make sure that I wasn't left any "surprises". After a scan over, I breathed a sigh of relief that Zancrow hadn't a chance to make a stop by my locker this morning.

After swapping out the things that I did need for what I didn't I closed my locker and exited the building. I headed for the lunchroom to grab something to eat when I heard my name being called out

"Tomo!"

I turned around and felt someone impact into me and wrap their arms around my waist. If I didn't know who this was then maybe I would have been surprised but it could only have been one person

"Morning, Chelia" I greeted

Chelia Blendy was without a doubt, my best friend of all time. We've been together since freshmen year and everything that I've ever had trouble with she was there to help me get through it and vice-versa. If her over the top personality wasn't enough to set her apart from the crowd then her amaranth hair does, she keeps it tied up in two pony tails by orange ribbons. She's a cheerleader and "wanna-be" actress/singer/activists/fashion designer/a bunch of other things that'll never happen

She pulled away from me and I took a silent breath of air to replace the amount that she squeezed from me

"So" She said twirling around making her dress flutter "You like?"

Her dress was orange and red stripes that went down vertically, now I'll admit she actually looked good, but I'd never admit it to her directly

"It's ok" I said pulling my backpack over my shoulder "Could be cuter"

She death glared at me and punched me in my arm playfully and I faked being hurt

"Jerk" she huffed and started walking beside me

"So, you ready for the big pep rally today" she asked excited

I shrugged "Not really, one pep rally is the same as the rest, and speaking about that, who schedules a rally on a Monday! Seriously, aren't those specifically for Friday's?"

She shrugged "Well, the coach doesn't want the jocks distracted for the game on Thursday, and the school wasn't going to cancel the rally" she said shaking her head back and forth "That would just not do; besides aren't you ready to go out there and strut your stuff"

Chelia jumped in front of me and started doing some very random dance move earning us a couple of strange stares from passerby's

"Chelia, please" I pleaded looking around "Even If I had any stuff to strut (Can't believe I just said that) I'm just going to be in the back, like always"

"Which I still say is a bunch of, B.S" she abbreviated "Everyone knows that you're one of the best dancers at MPA, but yet your stuck in the back with the rest of the freshy's"

Freshy's is Chelia's term for freshmen, if that wasn't clear

"If I were you (Here she goes), I would go directly to and demand that she put in the front line, I mean—

It was times like this that I was glad that I learned how to tune people out, even if there was some truth to what Chelia was saying. No matter how much I tried and nailed every routine that we performed, I was always stuck in the way back, which wasn't so bad but it still hit me in that certain spot, like maybe I wasn't as good as I thought or maybe—

"Hello! Are you even listening to me?" she said snapping in front of my face

"Huh, oh, yeah right" I replied still dazed

"Ugh, could you be any more insensitive" she said walking off from me, I sighed as I watched her walk round the corner

If there was one thing about Chelia, it was that she had this knack for switching form emotion to another in the drop of a dime

Not a second passed before she came back running up to me and hiding behind my back. I glanced back and saw that her face was a tinted bright pink

"What is it now?" I asked knowing very well what she was going to say

"There's this really cute guy coming around the cornor" she said patting down her hair

Ok, strike that other thing I said, if there was one thing about Chelia, it's how boy crazy she can get

"Shush" she said placing a finger over my lips

"I didn't say anything" I mumbled

"Shhhh" she spit at me "Here he comes!"

"Oh, boy"

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

"So, where am I taking you?"

Evergreen pondered on the thought for a minute "Take me to Freed's place, at least he'll feed me"

"You couldn't have told me that, like 10 minutes ago when we passed it the first time" he gacked at her

"Well I wasn't thinking about it, but now I am" she sneered

Laxus snickered his teeth and put the car in reverse to head to his other friend's restaurant. Freed Justine owned the café "Écriture" which was foreign for something, Laxus always forgot but the food and drinks were actually good, even by his standards

After a while, Laxus pulled into the parking lot of a medium sized dark brown colored building. The crystal clean windows showed that the establishment was opening but not busy at this time. There was a rose garden filled with brightly colored roses, they lined the outside of the front door but a tiled path prevented people from messing with the natural beauty.

Evergreen walked up to the front door and used the backside of her knuckle to knock on the door before peering inside. A tall, sharply dressed man with bright green haired looked at the woman with a confused face before unlocking the door

"Evergreen, Laxus" the man greeted respectfully

"Ugh, do you have to be so," Evergreen couldn't think of the word to describe

"If you're asking why I have to be a gentlemen, well" Freed grinned to himself "Blame it on my upbringing"

"Whatever" Evergreen said pulling out a chair and sitting while beginning to twirl her hair around her finger "I'm hungry, do you have anything to eat"

"That depends" Freed started "Are you going to actually pay this time?"

"And what, per say, are you implying?"

Laxus took a seat at the same table as Evergreen and chuckled at the antics of his friends

"Don't worry, about it" Laxus said placing his feet on the table "I'll pay for it"

Freed sighed "If you say so, I'll be back with a menu" he said before walking toward the back

"Well" Evergreen began "That was actually very nice of you" she beamed a Laxus

"Oh don't worry, you're paying me back" he grinned evilly at her "with interest"

"I'm not sleeping with you, if that's where you're going"

Laxus chuckled "Wouldn't dream of it"

Freed walked back into the room with a black rectangular menu with the name of the café carefully crafted legibly on it and a cup of steaming hot tea

"Here you are" he said placing the tea in front of Laxus and the menu in front of Evergreen

"Thanks" Laxus said lifting the hot cup carefully to his lips and sipping at the hot drink. He could feel it warm up his inside as it slid down his throat

Freed turned on the TV and changed it to the local news

"_Here's a brief update on the fire that devastated a local apartment complex_" the woman whose name was Mariam Brackendale, which he figured as it scrolled across the screen multiple times

"_The fire seemed to have originated in a young woman's room by accident, all locals in the apartment have been carefully and successfully evacuated, thanks to the help of the local fire department and there have only been cases of minor injury. There has not been a record of foul play and it all seems to have been caused by a lap of judgment_"

"_Thank you, Mariam" _another man spoke "_In other news"_

It was people like that, which caused Laxus's job to be the headache that it was. People should have the common sense to turn something off when there not using it or paying attention.

"_Glad I'm not there"_ Laxus smirked to himself

"What kind of person, burns down an entire complex" Evergreen said handing the menu back to Freed "You'd have to be completely oblivious to do something like that"

"You'd be surprised" Laxus said taking another sip "Say, didn't you almost—"

"Don't talk about that!" Evergreen shrieked, not wanting the business of her past mishaps conversed in public

Laxus phone buzzed in his pocket and he took it out and looked at it. His face turned from one full of confusion to one of shock.

Laxus jumped up making the chair fall to the ground, causing Freed to come from the back to see what the commotion was about

"What" Evergreen asked looking at Laxus confused

Without answering, Laxus grabbed his car keys and made a bee line for his car. Whatever was going on, Laxus wanted to make sure that he was present, because the message that Erza had just sent him, made no room for error:

"_Get your ass to the office, ASAP!" _

_- Erza_

* * *

The story is about to heat up! The next chapter is going to be a lot longer with a lot going on, trust me you don't want to miss it.

Please R&R Honestly


	4. Chapter 4

This is one of the longest chapter's that I have ever written for anyone of my stories, but whenever I wanted to stop another thing popped into my mind and just wouldn't stop nagging me. I was gonna wait till after I finished chapter 5 to post this but it's just to good to wait. Enjoy the read!

* * *

Chapter 4:

I always said to myself that If were to unexpectedly die, that I wouldn't want a big memorial service. Just my closest friends and family members there to mourn over my cold lifeless body. There would a slideshow showing the pictures of all the ordeals that had to overcome and a preacher would go on stage and say how I was taken way too soon.

My parents would give heart felt confession on how they loved my but never had the chance to express it whole heartedly. Juno would look around trying to figure out what was going on and why there were about to put me in the ground.

Chelia, oh boy, she would probably go off on everyone that said something about me and then have about ten emotional breakdown before coming to grip with everything that happened.

The school officials would milk the death for everything that it was worth. The school would get good and bad reviews but as they say, there's no such thing as bad publicity. Some of the students would talk about me like we were the best of friends, trying to get their 15 minutes of fame. Zancrow would go on to terrorize another student.

And I'd never get to realize my dream of dancing on national TV and having my own dance studio, where I could teach underprivileged children the wonders and joys of dance. But, that dream was long gone now.

The heat in the room intensified as the roar of the fire became brighter. The once carefully strung decorations were now nothing but a churned reminder left on the walls. The once detailed paint structure was now peeled and crumbled in pieces on the floor. The bleachers still stood but were engulfed in the flames which turned their tinted brown to a scorched black. Scattered bits of glass and plastic lined the floors.

Everything had gone so wrong, so fast.

First the bang, then the scream, and then the scramble. Bodies clashed and crushed as everyone tried to escape all at once, administration screaming for everyone to exit quickly and safely, to no avail I might add. Everyone had gotten out, well…everyone but me, because I had to be the stupid one to check and make sure that everyone else was out before I tried to escape.

Now here I am, stuck under a fallen support beam with a broken leg, about to either bleed out or burn to death. The deep gash on my forehead continued to bleed as I felt the thick blood side across my face. I struggled to move me leg from its crushed position but only felt as the pain surged up my leg.

Well, this was it. All of those things that I had ever dreamed of just suddenly went down the drain, never to be realized. I would laugh if I wasn't in so much pain, last year of high school, 17 years of trials and tribulations only to be cut short. And right now, all I wanted to do was dream

Dream…

Dream…

Dream…

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

The wheels to Laxus car screeched to a stop as he pulled up to the Magnolia fire department. He jumped out of the car and bust into the room through the double door earning stares from his co-workers

"Well, look who decided to show up" Natsu grinned as he pulled on his protective coat

Laxus ignored him and walked over to his storage locker and throwing everything that he didn't need or would slow him down in the line of action and began to pull on his gear

"Aye!" Gray shouted walking into the room "Natsu! Erza said get your ass— oh, Laxus's here" he said shocked

Laxus closed his locker door shut and through his coat over his shoulder

"Didn't expect to see you in today" Gray said moving over letting Laxus through

Laxus grunted "Yeah me neither; But, Erza text me and said that she wanted me here"

Laxus showed them the angry text message that he received and they both gulped

"Wow, better you then me" Natsu said landing a heavy handed slap onto Laxus's back

"Yeah, also make sure that you stay away from Gajeel" Gray said grinning "He's still pissed about the bet you two made, he won't stop saying your names"

Laxus got a dirty smirk on his face. He had already known that Gajeel was plotting against him but knew that no matter what the steel faced man challenged him at, he would win.

The three men walked into the main office of the fire house and all eyes shifted to Laxus

"He's alive everybody" Cana joked from her position on the counter "We figured that you'd be slumped over in a gutter somewhere"

"Haha" Laxus sat in the cheer on the other side of the room next to Juvia

"Juvia must admit, she is shocked to see you" Juvia said sitting up straighter "We heard rumors of your nightly escapade, and that you were "entertaining" company" she arched her eyebrow when she spoke

Laxus scuffed, even though he would never admit it, having everyone in his business was just one way that he know that they were his family. Even, when they would criticize him about his actions

He smirked "You heard right" he boasted modestly "But, I had to leave before things got" he searched for the right word off the top of his head "Serious"

Laxus heard something being ripped and side glanced to the recipients desk where Lucy was busy shredding something with a scowl on her face

"Problem, princess" he mocked

Lucy stuck her nose up in the air "Nothing, just hoping you have the decency to take precautions when you play around. We don't need you spreading some disease around or (god forbid) start reproducing" she muttered the last part to herself

"Seems like you want a demonstration" he joked suggestively making Lucy gawk in horror and disgust

"Hey!" Natsu looked between the two blonds "Don't get any ideas"

"Please" Lucy said banging her hands on the table "Not even if my life depended on it"

"Well, I wouldn't mind" Juvia said looking down shyly while blushing

Everyone stopped what they were doing and stared at the blue haired women in shock. Juvia looked up at everyone's surprised face and realized she needed to clarify

"Oh, not with Laxus though" she said waving her hand "But, with someone more" she glanced in Gray's direction making him turn his head

Laxus chuckled, even though when they all walked out of the building together to save someone, there was always that chance that one of them would not make it back, it was these moments where they could all just sit down and enjoy each other's company that made everything worth while

"Hey, where's Gajeel?" Laxus voiced noticing that the tall black haired man was nowhere to be found

"Oh, he lost the coin toss and has to file the paperwork for the last fire at that apartment complex" Cana answered

"Which mean's, it's going to be more work for me in the long run" Lucy groaned

They all chuckled but the room became dead silent when a serious looking Erza walked into the room. She scanned the room before speaking

"Alright, looks like everyone's here" she walked into the middle of the room where everyone could see her

"Listen up, I will not be repeating myself" her authorize voice banged off the walls of the room and engraving itself into everyone's skull

"A fire alarm has been triggered at one of the local high schools" she started

Cana groaned "Maybe's its some kid playing a joke, happens all the time"

Erza stared at the brown haired woman before continuing "Precisely my first thought, however" she paced around the room "We have received numerous phone calls, and it has been concluded that a fire has been set off in the school gymnasium"

The room was silent as everyone let out small gasps

Erza continued "It seems to be contained, but could spread at any minute"

"Well then what are we waiting for" Natsu jumped up from his sitting position "Let's go take care of this one, like we do all the others" everyone else started to mummer the same thing

"Just a second!" Erza shrieked making everyone become silent again "We also have word that the building is becoming unstable as we speak, but also, we are dealing with a teenage crowd so that adds even more pressure to this"

Laxus knew what Erza was talking about, the younger the people they had to deal with, the more they had to do to keep them calm.

"So" Erza paused "I want everyone to be in their top shape when dealing with this, also, make sure to not take any unnecessary risk, I want to see everyone back in this office alive. Am I clear?!"

"Sir!" Everyone roared

Laxus got up from his seat and watched as everyone scrambled to the fire truck. The adrenaline pumped through each of their vine's as they prepared themselves for the ordeal they were about to face

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

_2 hours until Mishap_

I cringed as the bell rung signaling the end of class. Everyone stuffed their belongings into their backpacks and exited the room as the teacher was yelling some last minute instructions.

I just finished my Trigonometry class and was headed to Advanced Placement Literature when I heard someone call me name. I turned around only to me met with a water balloon in the face

As the water ran down my face taking the shame with it, Zancrow and a couple of the other football players were standing there, laughing and pointing at my misfortune. They walked past me and purposefully bumped into my shoulders as they continued to laugh and high five each other.

I sighed and made the un-necessary trip to my locker where I kept an extra change of clothes. As I got to my locker, there Chelia was, waiting for me. Her face brightened up when she saw me but frowned when she had seen me sopping wet

I groaned and proceeded to open my locker and Chelia took the empty spot beside me

"Zancrow?" she asked already knowing the answer

"No, it was a mermaid" I answered sarcastically as I pulled my now wet, button up shirt off and replaced it with the black dance team shirt that we were wearing during today's performance

'You know" she started "I don't know why Zancrow, made you his target" she pondered the thought

"Uhm" I absentmindedly answered as I checked my reflection in my locker mirror. I know it may be a little girly but with the things I go through on a daily basis, I needed something to make sure my appearance was, at least adequate

"I mean, there a bunch of better targets to mess with" she said placing her back onto the locker and popping her left foot up

"Sure" I said slicking my hair back down

"The only thing that I can think of, and this is just off the top of my head, but could it possibly having something to do with you liking guys" she finished her thought looking at me

"_No duh, Sherlock"_ I thought while closing my locker door

"I mean, you're not the only openly gay student here, but maybe" she pondered the thought for a minute while I grabbed my stuff and headed for the door "Maybe he has a thing for you"

I stopped in my tracks and looked at her as If she had just called "Bomb" in the middle of the airport

"Really, that's what you come up with" I asked arching my eyebrow's at her

"What" she said making her hands slap against her thighs "It could be that, maybe he has to bully you to show his affection"

I opened my mouth to say something but the bell ringing cut me off

"Shouldn't you be heading to, French" I said hoping that she would leave

"Oh! Your right" she said realizing what I just said "I got to go, but we are not done with this conversation" she said backing up slowly from me

"Au revoir" I said waving goodbye

When Chelia, was out of earshot I let out a various collection of frustrated groans and somber sighs. Whenever I had something going on with Chelia, she had to bring it back to me being gay. Maybe it was the cause of the problem, and of course I had already thought about that, but if everyone took the time to actually find out the actual facts instead of jumping to conclusion, then maybe a lot of the things that happened to me, well… wouldn't happen

I was too wrapped up in my own personal conversation that I didn't notice the rolling table in front of me until I felt something run smack dab in the middle of my stomach. I stumbled for a moment before regaining my composure

"Oh, I'm sorry" a meek voice called out from behind the table

I already knew who that voice belong to "No, it's okay Dexter, I should have been paying attention" I said walking around the table to get a good view

Dexter (Who's real name was David, but everyone just called him Dexter because the dude is insanely smart) was a medium sized boy with flat brown and black hair with huge round glasses. He always walked with his head down, making him have to adjust his glasses non stop

Dexter pushed his glasses up onto his face "Oh, hello Tomo" he smiled

"Hey" I greeted back "So, what's all this" I said looking at the table that had a white sheet over it but through the sheet you could see small protruding objects

"Oh, this" he said pointing to the table "The science club is going to show case our new invention at the pep rally" he sniffed in between his words "But, there are still a few kinks to work out"

'What does it do" I said trying to peek underneath the blanket

"NO!" Dexter smacked my hand away and pushed his back up against the table

"Ow" I said wagging my hand

"S-Sorry" he blushed "But, it's still not ready to be seen"

"OK, then" I narrowed my eyes at him "_Never mess with a science club member's stuff, noted"_

"Aye!" another voice yelled

Both Dexter and I turned our hands to see none other than, Andrew Exlis, walking toward his. His hands were stuffed in his pocket and he scowled at the both of us.

Dexter started to tremble a little as he got closer to us

"What are you two doing?" he asked looking back and forth between the both of us

"Umm" Dexter went in front of the table "I was just leaving, see you later Tomo" he said as he hurriedly pushed the table away

Andrew snickered his teeth "What's his issue?"

"Maybe he's allergic to liars" I mumbled to myself

"What was that?" he said taking a step closer to me

I looked up and saw that he was looking down at me, in a literal and ambiguous term of since

I opened my mouth to repeat what I had just said, but decided against getting into an altercation before the pep rally

"Nothing" I said giving him a big smile. I smiled because of two things, 1) Because me smiling made me use the muscle and energy that I would have other wised used to punch him in the face and 2) It confused the heck out of him

"Right" he said looking down and kicking at the ground

Things then got a little to quiet for my taste

"Well" I began "Not that I don't love chatting with you, but I don't, later" I walked past him but felt him grab at my arm. I quickly snatched my arm from his grasp making him back up a little

"Umm" he started to say something but couldn't get it out

"Did you want something or are you just wasting my time" I barked at him, surprising even myself

"Hey, you haven't told anyone about" He started to use his hand's gesturing something and of course I knew what he meant, which pissed me off even more

"Look, if I haven't said anything after all this time, then why would I now" I said shaking my head at him. He pushed his lips together and didn't say anything else, I rolled my eyes and walked off to my next class which I was already late for.

If there was one thing that I couldn't stand, it was someone that used another person just to get what they wanted. If other's had to work hard then so should everyone else.

I grunted in frustration and placed a hand over my fast beating heart trying to calm myself down, even though I might have appeared to be all tough, it was still prevalent that Andrew was both taller and stronger than me; But if people knew what I knew, then the tables could be turned in the matter of a second.

But could I seriously bring myself to do it, was the real question I had to ask myself

I walked into the English department and took a deep breath before knocking ad entering the classroom. All eyes were on me as I stepped in

"Uh-hum, Sorry I'm"

"Your Late!" the teacher loud voice made me ears ring

"Late" I finished sighing

_1 Hour and 35 minutes to Mishap_

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

The deafening sound of the fire truck siren continued to loop as they arrived at the school in record time. The fire set ablaze the right part of the school as apparent as the smoke came directly from that direction

There was already a group bystanders in the way of them getting there job done and Laxus wanted nothing more than to tell them to mind their own fucking business but they had more pressing matters to take care of

"Okay" Natsu said as they all hopped out of the truck "Cana, can you make sure that all the bystanders are separated from the students"

Cana nodded in agreement and went to do her job

"Laxus, can you check on the students and teachers and make sure that everyone got out, and Gray and I, will take care of the fire"

Laxus wanted to say something about Natsu giving him the orders but at this point in time, he was actually making sense

Laxus ran over to where Cana had separated the student's from the other pedestrians. As he scanned over their faces, some of them were huddled together and crying, somewhere on the phone yelling at someone with shocked expressions, and others just stood there, staring up at the fire. It only took about 10 minutes for Natsu and Gray, to get the hose started and to start douching the flame

Laxus walked over to a tall man, who he hoped was a teacher. The man was averagely built with a tight long sleeve shirt and plain white tie

"Excuse me" Laxus got the man attention

"Has everyone been evacuated?"

The man looked stunned for a minute because he didn't move or respond, the expression on his face showed that he had never witnessed something like this before

"Uh" he started before gaining his composure slightly "I believe so, god, this is a nightmare" he used his hand to wipe the sweat from his eyes

Laxus rolled his eyes, dealing with the crowd was definitely not the most exciting part of his job. People wanted to cry and grab onto you and spill all their emotions on you.

"It'll be alright" he reassured "The fire should be taken care of shortly"

"_It better be" _Laxus though in the back of his head

After about 20 minutes, the fire was mostly put out and Natsu and Gray came back looking very much pleased with themselves

"Record Time" Gray said fist bumping Natsu

Cana ran back over to the group "I've checked around, and it seems like everyone made it out, okay"

They all breathed a sigh

"Tomo? Tomo!" A young girl with pinkish or purplish hair went around looking. She was wrapped in a blanket and looked around with a sense of horror on her face. She saw us and ran over

" Mr. Fix" she grabbed at the man's shirt with trembling hands "I can't find Tomo, and I looked everywhere"

When she said that, all our blood went cold as we looked at the extinguished building

"Maybe he's here and you just haven't seen him" The man assured trying to calm himself and the girl down

A brown haired girl soon ran up to the last one and they smiled and hugged

"Chelia, I'm so glad I found you" she greeted

The other one smiled back but then her face became serious "Lina, have you seen Tomo?" the girl asked filled with hope

Lina gasped and said the words that none of us wanted to hear, "He's not with you, he went back into the building looking for you" she said grabbing the girls hands

Everyone looked around at each other waiting for someone to say something,

"Has anyone seen, Tomoyashi Brackendale!" yelled, his voice trembling

"Tomo?'

"Wasn't he with you?"

"I haven't seen him"

"Wait! I do remember seeing him earlier"

"Hold on, didn't he go back in the building looking for Chelia"

"Gasp! You're right, he did go back in"

"But I didn't see him come out, yet"

"You don't think"

"Oh my god, he's still in the building!"

The crowd started to stir with commotion. They all stared at the building with rapt attention, Laxus felt his heart beating down in his stomach and knew that whatever they were going to do, they had to do it fast

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

_1 hour and 5 minutes until Mishap_

"And one and two, and one and two" Ms. Cortez counted as we stretched out, getting ready for dance practice

"Pssh" a voice whispered

I pretended not to hear and continued to stretch out my legs

"Aye, I know you hear me"

I opened one of my eyes and glanced over next to me, Chise had sky blue hair that was twisted into a ponytail. She was grinning at me as she bent all the way backwards and touched the floor. She came back up and smirked at me

"Been working on that one for a minute" she boasted "Jealous?"

"Nobody wants to see what you do on weekends" I grinned as her face slumped and she spun away from me

Honestly, I wasn't a mean person but I had enough of people trying to show off for one day and her being extra flexible was not something that currently peaked my interest. Well, maybe a little

"Okay" Mr. Cortez clapped making everyone look at her. She looked at the clock on the wall and cleared her throat

"Since we only have a limited amount of time, I will go over the pep rally schedule" she rolled out a piece of paper and started to speak

I tuned out her voice as I thought back to everything that I had ever done at MPA. It was senior year, the year that everything was supposed to be perfect, but instead I didn't know where I wanted to go to college, I hadn't decided what I wanted to do with my life if dancing didn't work out and wondered what It would be like if I had to live with my parents for the rest of my life. After I had depressed myself enough, I tuned back in

"After that, Vijeteer will perform his solo" she nodded

Viljeeter, was actually a really good dancer, but he always had this disposition of frowning all the time even when he was happy

"Then, Orie and Nobu, will perform their allemande and as soon as you two get down, the rest of you will get in position for the final dance segment"

If there was one thing in this world that I will never understand, it was how those two got together. Orie always walked around have naked, while Nobu wasn't the most masculine guy in the world, he had a great personality… You interpret that with how you will. Opposites attract I guess

"Tomo"

I turned my head to show that I was, _somewhat, _listening "Yes"

"You will be in the center back, okay" she said smiling

I gave her the fakest smile I could muster, her saying the center back was basically her attempt at making me feel better. The only thing that people were going to see was my butt, because of my placement.

"Asuka, you will be in the front center, so make sure that you and Tomo, line up" she glanced at the girl that sat in the front row. She nodded at Ms. Cortez and waited for her to turn around so she could sneer in my direction

Asuka was a girl with strawberry blond hair and tan white skin. She and I would be what you called, Divals (Dance-Rivals). She's that one person, who's the teacher's pet, the biggest flirt, cutest clothes, all that typical high school jargon. She tried to flirt with me once, but after a couple of misunderstandings, she became me dancing rival. Because I'm always in the back and she's in the front, she believes that she's beaten me (Which she has in a way)

"Oops, before I forget, I have a big announcement" Ms. Cortez beamed "In a couple of weeks, auditions will be held for the school district competition" she grinned excited "I want each and every one of you to audition and show what we at MPA, have to offer"

A freshmen boy raised his hand

"Yes?"

"Is it for a grade" the boy asked

"Well no, but its great practice for those of you who would like to enter the dancing world professionally"

"Sooooo, no grade"

Ms. Cortez rubbed her temple in annoyance "No"

"Good"

Ms. Cortez was one of those teacher that you knew that you could talk to about your problems, and knew she wouldn't talk about it. At school probably not, but off the clock is a different story. She was a woman about in her 40's, curly black locks dawned her head. Even for a woman in her age, she was still very nimble, if someone had a problem with the routine, she would be more than happy to demonstrate.

Orie raised her hand "Is it solo or teams this year"

The school system wanted to make the competition as, what's the word, un-routinely as possible. So each year the competition switched from being solo to team

Ms. Cortez smiled "This year is extra special, it going to be a mixture of both solo's and teams"

This news shocked everyone, even I was surprised. Never once had I heard this being done, I wonder why this year was so different

"I know that many of you have questions, but I'll post the flyer up later with the information" she said eyeing the clock "We only have few minutes to get ready, I want everyone dressed and ready to go" she walked into her personal room and closed the door

Everyone started having their own conversation while I grabbed my stuff. A shadow casted over me and I glanced up to see Asuka, looking down at me

"Can I help you?" I asked suspicious

"You thinking about signing up, this year"

"Not really" I responded throwing my bag over my shoulder

"Oww, that's too bad" she said frowning maniacally "Beating you on a whole nother level, would just make my day"

"Says the person that can't even make it to the finals" I couldn't believe the nerve of this chick, trying to put me down just because I've never wanted to compete

"At least I have the experience to win. Unlike you, I not afraid to lose with grace" she sneered

"If you say so" I said walking off from her

"Just remember" she called out "I'm in the front row for a reason"

I really wanted to turn around and say something to that, but the better half of me told me to take the high road on this one. But one of these days, my urge to go back and do something is going to get the best of me

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Laxus and the other rendezvoused back at the fire truck to access the situation and the best course of action

"Damn" Natsu spat "We don't have all day to choose what to do, the building is structurally unsafe and could go down at any minute"

"We don't even know if the kid is still in there" Gray thought aloud

"But what if they are?" Juvia said making us all ponder on the thought

We all knew that going into the building was a risk, but if there is someone in there, then this job just got a whole lot harder. Laxus looked at the sinking building, they had about 20 minutes, not even that, to choose what to do

"Alright" Natsu started "Laxus, Gray and I will go into the building and check it out, if the kid is in there, we have to quickly get him out, but if it's empty, let's not take the chance and stick around. Everyone got it"

Everyone nodded in agreement

"Cana" he looked at the woman "Keep an ambulance on standby, just in case"

"Right" she ran off

"Juvia, move the truck so that the ambulance has room"

"Juvia understands" Juvia jumped into the truck

Natsu looked at Laxus and Gray "You guys ready to do this"

The all placed their hand in circle on top of each other

"On three, Magnolia" Gray counted "1…2….3!"

"Magnolia" the all yelled and ran to the truck to get their equipment

Laxus knew that the little chant they did was so that if anyone of them were going in to do something dangerous, that the last thing that they would remember of each other was the pride they had in their work.

Laxues grabbed what he needed, his mask, oxygen tank, and the axe. He didn't know what he would find inside, but he would have the tools to chop his way outside. Laxus didn't know what would happen, but he knew one thing:

"_That kid is getting out of this alive"_

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

_35 minutes to Mishap_

The gym was filled with deafening scream of excitement and anticipation. The different grade levels were set up in different sections on the bleachers. Freshmen next to Juniors and then Freshmen next to Seniors. Kind of strange but it works out, well.

The dance team had a designated section that was opposite side the cheerleaders. Chelia noticed me and waved, I smiled and waved back before taking my seat. The band came in playing one of their pep songs and the noise in the room intensified and they took their spot underneath the score keeper

The principle came in an gave his speech about what he wanted to see happen for the rest of the school year, and what he didn't want and all of that spiel

After he got off the stage and everyone cheered and clapped. The instrumental beat to Iggy Azalea – Fancy, came on and the cheerleader's jumped and back flipped down to their spots. Chelia was on the side corner, so I had full view of her. She did some turns and flips before moving to another spot. Even though Chelia was my best friend, I had to say that their routine was basically some overzealous stripper pole routine. Angel of course, was in the front shaking what little she had for everything she was worth, and the crowd was of course eating it up. The song ended with them posing in the middle of the gym, while the crowed hollered with excitement.

I joined in because I was being a supportive friend, and even with all my griping, I had some school spirit

"Checking out your girlfriend" Chise said sarcastically

I rolled my eyes and grinned before leaning back "No, I was checking out your "_not_" boyfriend" I said gesturing to Sting in the crowd

"Ow, good one" she scowled kicking me in the back, making my chuckle

Even though Chise and I would get into each other's business, it didn't mean that we don't like each other

After that the band played another song and then the basketball coach came out and called for all of his athletes to which Sting, who was too excited for his own good, basically stepped on people's head to get down to the front. The coach gave a few words here and there before passing the mic to the players. Of course, they all joked around until the mic got to Sting

"All I have to say is" he mustered through random fits of laughter "Come out and support us, because we are awesome!" he screamed and the crowd went wild

I tapped on Chise to get her attention "You wet yet?"

Her eyes widened as a blush crept on her face and she started kicking at me again making me laugh even more

Her crush on Sting was something that I could always bother her with, but I wouldn't take it farther then mild joking

The basketball team walked back to their spot and the football team took their place, Zancrow and Sting high fived each other as they passed. The whole team stood in the middle of the gym as the crowd cheered both admiration, and fear

Zancrow's eyes scanned the audience and landed on me, he grinned evilly making a cold chill run down my back. Whatever he had planned in that crazy mind of his, I didn't want to be a part of it. The football coach came out and spoke about the year and how the game coming up soon was big, because if they won this game then they would go to state, which MPA hasn't done in a while. The game was against our rival school, the Sterling Red Wolfs to which the room was filled with, discontent boo's

The coach tried to calm them down to no avail, but Zancrow grabbed the mic

"Shut up!" he bellowed and the room became dead silent

"Now, let me tell you what's going to happen" he grinned "We are going to go and give those Sterling losers, the ass kicking that they deserve" the room came alive again with fearful admiration. Zancrow laughed before speaking again

"And when we win, not only are we going to demolish them, but we're going to shit on that stupid ass place that they call a school"

The crowd had mixed emotions about that one but clapped none the less. The coach grabbed the microphone from Zancrow and nervously looked at the principle, who edged him on to continue

"Thank you, for those inspiring, um words" the coach chuckled as the team went back to the bleachers

"Now, please give it up for some performances by the, Dance team" the crowd cheered and clapped still recovering from that "pep" talk they just received

Vijeeter's music started as he began to move and jump around. I watched intently waiting for all this to be over

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Laxus, Gray, and Natsu walked up to the now charred door of what remained of the gym

"You ready" Natsu said gulping

"Ready, as I'll ever be" Laxus muttered as he kicked the door down. It went down with no problem after being burned for so long

"Careful, Laxus" Gray warned "This place could collapse any minute, we don't need to rush it"

"Fine" he grunted in return

They looked around the room carefully, taking in the damage that the room had managed to obtain in a short amount of time. Everything that once had color was now burned and black. As they walked over a fallen poster, it wrinkled and tore apart under the weight of their boots. They took notice of all the broken glass and plastic and look up at the ceiling were a speaker lay hanging by it wires

Natsu came from the bathrooms in the back "No one back here"

Gray checked all of the bleachers and came back nodding his head

"Anything" Laxus asked

"Nope, nothing"

Laxus looked around the room and could hear the sound of the roof starting to wane and creak

Natsu sighed "Looks like there's no one in here" he said kicking a charcoaled piece of something

"Yep" Gray said taking one more look around

"Man, I thought there was going to be some real action" Natsu whined as Gray patted him on the back

"Come on" he said as they both started walking for the door

Laxus looked around one more time but still didn't seem anything, besides rubble upon rubble.

"Laxus" Natsu called

"You coming?" Gray finished

Laxus sighed before heading to the door. Just when you was about to leave, Laxus heard something, something really faint. He stopped and looked around but didn't see anything. Then, he heard the sound again

"_H….l….p"_

Laxus eyes widened as he turned his head to where he could hear the noise. He ran in the direction of the rubble and scanned it for any sign of life. He bent down and started to rummage through the rubble

"Laxus, what's going on" Gray called but he ignored him

Laxus continued to dig and stopped when he saw something that shocked him

A hand. A limp hand but a hand none the less

"Aye!" he shriked grabbing Natsu's and Gray's attention "I found somebody" he yelled continuing to dig underneath the rubble to the body

"Hold on, kid!" he yelled as he dug faster

"_Don't you dare, die on me!"_

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

_15 minutes to Mishap_

After Orie and Nobu finished their routine, the rest of us quickly got lined up in the dance formation. I headed for the back and stood in my spot so that everyone else could get line up, to me. Asuka took her spot in the front and all I could see was her backside. The beat of the music started and we all took our first position, which was basically holding our fist's together while we rocked to the music. I looked around and that's when I noticed Asuka. She was looking around frantically, like

"_She doesn't know the moves"_

Dammit it all! There she was, trying to throw shade at me for not being in the front when she didn't even know what we were doing. My first thought was to leave her up there while she fumbled through the dance, teach her a lesson. But, my conscious told me otherwise.

"Darn, my good nature" I mumbled to myself

I looked around and kicked the girl in front of me

"Oww" she said looking back at me

"Switch places with me" I whispered

She looked at me like I was crazy "No!"

"Just do it" I hissed at her

She thought about it before, we quickly exchanged spots. I did this 3 more times before I took the spot directly next to Asuka. She glanced at me with a face full of horror

"What are you doing?" she said through gritted teeth

"Oh, you know, better lighting, all that" I said sarcastically

The music started and I turned facing the wall, and Askua grudgingly did the same.

_Well, I've been neglecting_

_The good things, oh, oh, woah_

_Well I've been desiring_

_The good things, oh_

_I'm biting the lighting_

_The good things, oh, oh, woah_

_I've minding what to see_

_The good things, oh, oh, woah_

We did couple of side steps, and turned around to face the other part of the wall, and each line would do a shoulder roll in the opposite direction then the last line, creating a wave effect

_Shake me out of my misery_

_Oh, oh, woah, oh, oh_

_Make me get out_

_And wiggle it, oh, oh_

The next thing was to get on one knee and kick out with the other leg, while the back row would get on the opposite knee and start banging on the ground

_Clap your hands, clap your hands_

_Turn the lights on my nights_

_This is life_

_And we only get one thing_

Every time the part of the song got to "clap your hands" we would all start clapping. The point was to see if the crowd would respond with the same action, which apparently they were. We got up from our knees and I turned to face Asuka, who was about to do the same but I mouthed for her not to and to face me.

_I'm trying to fly in the good things_

_Oh, oh, woah_

_I'm finding this might be a good thing_

_Oh, oh, woah_

I outstretched my arms for my body and made a diagonal line with it and made Asuka do the opposite. The effect here was for us to mirror each other's moves. After a couple of more moves the "clap your hands" repeated and Asuka caught on (Thank goodness). The moves repeated themselves and the song finally came to end as we all struck our final pose

The crowd roared in applause and we all bowed before heading back to the bleacher. I looked to where the teacher were standing and Ms. Cortez did not look happy. Even when I went out of my way to help someone else, I was still going to get an earful.

I sighed and slumped down in my seat

"_This sucks"_

_5 minutes to Mishap_

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Laxus could feel the sweat bead off his face as he continued to toss the rubble in different directions. Gray and Natsu couldn't believe that he had actually found someone. They started digging at the bottom of where Laxus had found the hand to see if they could uncover, the rest of the body.

"Hey!" Natsu called out "I found the leg"

Laxus peered over his head but continued to dig until he reached the kid completely.

The continued to dig until he could see the top of a head

"_Could this be"_ Laxus grabbed handfuls of the rubble and moved it to the side until a face could be seen. Laxus carefully dusted the stray debris away and took a step back to see the face.

This boy could have been mistaken for a girl with the long hair and delicate facial structure, but the dust and bloody face took away from all that.

"Aye! I found the face" Laxus called out, huffing from exhaustion

"Alright" Gray cheered

"Is the kid breathing?" Natsu called

Laxus placed his ear to the boy's face but couldn't hear anything. He placed it on his chest and his eyes widened

"Shit!"

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

_5 minute to Mishap_

The band played their last song and the crowd was now running purely off the energy that the performances gave them. I was actually tired myself and I only had danced twice. The second dance, I made sure to stay in my spot as to not evoke the wrath of Ms. Cortez anymore then I already had

"Now I know some of you may be tired" the coach spoke on the mike making the crowd try their best to prove him wrong

"Alright then, let's give it up for the science club" the coach clapped and made everyone join in. I saw Dexter and a couple of the other members pushing in the table from earlier, but whatever it was, it was now put together because the sheet bulged out in all directions.

Mr. Ricardio, the science teacher and club director took the microphone before speaking

"On behalf of the science department, we would like to thank you all for giving us the change to showcase our brand new invention. But," he looked around "I'll let the president explain, what exactly we have been working on"

He passed the microphone to Dexter who looked shocked and nervous

"U-Umm, thank you" he said trembling slightly

I looked around and could tell that people weren't the least bit interested in what he was saying. So I decided to do something about that

"Wooo! Dexter!" I screamed and started clapping. Of course everyone looked at me like I was crazy and I looked at my dance team for support, some of them awkwardly joined me, while other looked away. I heard someone yell on the other side of the room and looked down to see Chelia cheering too. Some people joined in but others just didn't pay attention.

Dexter looked in my direction and I gave him a thumbs up. He took a big breath before speaking again

"Ok" he nodded to the other members and they peeled the sheet off revealing a contraption of different wheels and pulleys, and things that I couldn't even describe

"Okay, so, what's the biggest problem facing the world today" he asked the crowd. No one said anything, but someone did cough

"Energy, right" he smiled "We have worked on a device that can take kinetic energy, and without the use of physical labor, produce safe and effective energy for the world's use" Dexter handed the microphone back to the teacher and walked over to the device. He took a long extension cord and walked over to the control box for the loud speakers. He plugged it and tapered with the controls before giving the other members a signal.

Two of the people gave each of the pulleys a tug and the machine started with a rumble before a couple of lights flashed. The wheels spun around and soon after the speakers started playing and the music echoed through the room. Everyone started whooping and cheering until the speaker made a spurting type of sound and the sound stopped.

"Awww" the cheering and adulation soon turned sour

Dexter's face dropped as he ran over to check on the invention

"Umm, well, there are still few kinks to work out" Mr. Ricardio chuckled nervously "But let's give a round of applause anyway"

The crowd gave a sloppy clap

"Loser" a voice loudly coughed out making the gym roar in laughter

"Zancrow!" the football coach yelled making everyone stop laughing. The coach pointed toward him and to the spot next to him. Zancrow rolled his eyes and crawled from out of the crowd and next to the coach. The principle eyed him carefully before giving his last speech. Everyone started to leave when it happened.

_Mishap in 3…2…1…_

Suddenly the speakers started acting up and they released a high frequency pitched sound that caused everyone in the room to cover their ears in agony. I closed my eyes and ears trying to block out as much of the sound a possible, when the sound stopped, everyone looked at the center where the science team was, and even they looked surprised.

After that, things got quiet, except for the soft thumping of the sound system. After a moments, a loud bass echoed from the speaker, and that's when it happened

The bang…

* * *

A lot happened in this chapter and it's only the beginning. Stay tuned!

Please R&R Honestly


	5. Chapter 5

Okay, so last time we found Tomo in a rather sticky situation, want to know what happens?...

Then read! on to the story!

* * *

Chapter 5:

The explosion caught everyone off guard. The speaker blew causing sparks and pieces of metal to fly out everywhere. The band was standing underneath the speaker when it blew, causing them to drop their instruments and scramble before they were crushed. The sparks caught a piece of the gold and red paper streamers that where strung up around the room, and they were the first things to go

The next thing that happened was the scream. I don't know who it was but it was definitely female (at least I hope it was a girl). The scream was the only thing people needed to hear to make the next thing happen

The scramble. Everyone started to head for the door in one swift frantic frenzy. People were being squished and stepped on as everyone dashed for the door. Administration yelling, the principle had fainted and the coaches had to carry him out. A couple of people tripped and stumbled down the bleachers in their attempts to make it out.

I stood still frozen in my spot not sure how to take all of this in, it wasn't until the other dance members pushed me out of the way, that my brain started to react again. I was pushed to the side and grabbed onto one of the side rails to keep my balance. The amount of fear was apparent on everyone's face as the smell of adrenaline and desperation filled the room. I looked up and watched as the streamers led the flame to the commemorative poster that the art club had done for the principle. The painting went up in seconds and the room began to be filled with smoke. Visibility began to become clouded and the only thing that could be seen was the flashing lights of the fire alarm.

I felt someone tug at my arm and I turned to see Chise

"What are you waiting for" she screamed at me "Come on" she grabbed my arm and began to drag me out of the building. When we got outside, we both started to take lungful breathes of air. I leaned on my knees for support and she fell to the ground

"Thanks" I said between gasps of breath. She lay on the ground breathless but gave me a thumbs up as a response. I outstretched my hand to her and she gladly took it, she leaned her weight on me and we both trudged to the front of the school. When we got there, on lookers had already gathered on the outside of the school to watch the commotion. I walked over to an empty shaded part of the grass and we both slumped to the ground. After catching my breath, I leaned up and looked around, faculty was busy running around to all students making sure that they were okay, other people were on their phones yelling about something but I was too far away to hear. Others were getting wrapped in the emergency blankets that teachers keep in the back of their classrooms that no one really thinks about.

The more I repeated the events over in my head, the more I couldn't comprehend what just happened. Everything that I thought ever possible to happen at MPA, the gym catching fire was never one of them. This was definitely going to be all over the news for sure. Maybe Chelia could actually get discovered from this:

"_Local Superstar found at School Tragedy"_ I chuckled at the thought

After a while, Mr. Kingston the economics teacher, came over and checked on me and Chise. He handed us a blanket and I turned to Chise and found her asleep. I smiled and placed the blanket over her and stood up to look around. I walked over and talked to a couple of people, some where a little shaken up but a couple of others were laughing about it

"No school" a couple chanted and we laughed

I continued to walk around looking for Chelia but couldn't find her. I waked back to the entrance and saw a couple of cheerleaders huddled together. I walked over

"Hey" they looked up at me "Have you guys seen Chelia?"

The looked at each other confused "She's not with you?"

I shook my head

"She ran around looking for you after the fire started, I don't know where she is now"

Those words made my heart sink down into my stomach, I didn't hear what they said after that because I started dashing around trying to see if I could find her. I talked to a bunch of other people and they said the last time that they had seen her, she was inside looking for me. The wave of paranoia that hit almost caused me to stumble over. Different images of Chelia, hurt and injured raced through my mind.

I looked in the direction of the burning gym and my body made the first move before my mind could make a decision. I bolted through the door and was instantly hit in the face by the toxic smoke. I inhaled a bit making me gag slightly but I covered my mouth and pressed on. The room was coming down all around me as the fire demolished everything in sight, the smoke made no room for visibility

"Chelia!" I screamed in hopes that she would respond, but in the process I inhaled more smoke into my body

I choked before running into the bathrooms, first the boys, I checked every stall before running over to the girls and turning up nothing on both side. I ran back into the gym and looked around, the smoke was beginning to make my eyes water which hindered my chances of seeing even more. I hit the floor and gagged some more to the point where I thought I was going to empty my stomach on the spot. I crawled my way over to the door and just before I reached it, I heard the whining sound of wood creaking, I looked up just in time to see part of the ceiling cave in and about to fall directly on me. I admittedly pushed myself from off the ground and ran, narrowly missing the rubble falling on top of me

It took me a minute to recover from what had happened, and for me to release that my only exit had been sealed. I tried to push some of the rubble out of the way to no avail. I looked around for another escape route and saw the windows at the top of the bleachers. I knew that I couldn't fit through them but I could at least try and call for help. I carefully made my way to the top and pressed against the glass with all the strength that I could muster and managed to creak it slightly. I pressed my lips through the crack and took in as much air as I could before I belted out. I screamed for about 10 minutes straight before I realized that no one could hear me, that no one could come and help me, that I was trapped. My throat ached from the strain that I had just put my vocals cords through. The itch was unbearable but I had more pressing matter to worry about.

Like how I was going to get out of this alive

By this time, I was tired. Everything that I had gone through that day had taken its toll on me and I wanted nothing more than to drop where I was. It had become harder to breath, visible by the sharp gasp of breath that I had to take just to keep moving. I mustered the last of my strength and decided to drag myself over to the least burned area and to just wait for someone to come and find me. I grabbed the side railing and carefully made my way down, only tripping slight a couple of times. When I reached the floor, everything blurred for a second and I stumbled. The heat had taken a toll on my by now and I was beginning to become dehydrated. My ears rang as I took another step forward, the world around me continued to become hazy and before I knew it, I felt myself fall backwards and the world went black.

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

I don't know how long I was out, but when I came too, I was still in the middle of the burning gym. I turned my head side to side but that only caused a splitting headache. I could feel something heavy on my body and tried to move my foot but was meet with excruciating pain. I gritted my teeth and managed to lean myself up to the point that I could see that my leg was trapped underneath one of the gyms support beams. I could also feel blood running down the side of my face. I leaned back on the ground and sighed. I concluded that I must have fainted from the heat and was crushed by some falling debris.

I was times like these when your life was supposed to flash before your eyes, right? When you're supposed let go of all your regrets so that you could live a happy afterlife. When an angel is supposed to present itself to you clothed in all white and give you a one way ticket to heaven or hell. But, I didn't get any of that (At least I don't think hell is supposed to look like my school's gym); All I had was a broken or sprained leg, or maybe both, and I deep gash on top of my forehead.

And now here you all are, the point in the story where I was before I explained to you what happened. In retrospect, the only thing that I had hoped that I did more was eat, if I had one regret, it was that I didn't get to eat more things (pretty silly right?). Actually dying isn't all that scary, it was just really painful.

…

This is it, huh. Everything that I hoped and dream of ever doing was cut short at this moment. And I wasn't even scared. I was just… alone

I could feel something wet run down the side of my face, I bent my hand up and touched the wet spot and pulled it back, I brought the wet substance to me lips and tasted it

"_Hmm, salty"_

I was only after a minute that I figured it out… I was crying

Salty, wet tears streamed down my face like an overflowing puddle. I knew that I was crying, but couldn't figure out why. They couldn't be tears of joy, or anger, then what could they be.

They weren't tears of sadness that was for sure

But, maybe… somewhere, deep, deep, down. I was actually afraid of dying, afraid of being alone, afraid… of everything.

My lips tightened together as a lump suddenly formed in my throat. I let out wails of dry sobs, loud screams of anguish that only the roar of the flames could hear. My already hoarse voice only seemed to make the noise that more unbearable.

"Someone! Anyone! Please, come help me!"

"I-I don't want to die!, not like this"

"Please…just…help me" I chocked out

My cries of desperation only fell on deaf ear. No one could hear me and no one was coming. The tears continued to fall, almost blinding me.

After everything I had been through, all the facade's and walls that I built up around to protect myself from my onslaught's, all the unshed tears and moments of weakness that I pushed to the sides to stay strong, none of that mattered now. All I wanted to do was to keep living, to make all my un-accomplished goals accomplished, to change myself into a better person, one that could honestly talk about his feeling instead of hiding behind a wall of humor.

A person…that could learn to love himself

That was the last thought I had, before blacking out again

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

The last time I woke up, I felt something wet wash over my face. It wasn't tears this time, but something wetter. I blinked a couple of times and shifted my eyes around to see that the flames had been extinguished and the room was covered in water.

My first thought was that I had to be dreaming, but I could actually feel the water, it had saturated my clothes to the point that they were sticking to my body. Not only had the water stopped the fire, but also managed to push some of the debris on me, covering my body completely. Maybe it was the pain talking, but I could have sworn that I had heard voice off in the distance.

I could feel my mouth moving but couldn't tell if any sound was coming out. Maybe my angel had come to whisk me off to the promise land after all. Little did I know, my angel was going to turn out to be nothing like I had expected.

XOXOXOXOXOXOXO

"Shit!" Laxus sneered

"Gray!" he shouted, grabbing the man attention "Come over here"

Even though Laxus didn't want to admit it, Gray was more capable of finding vitals signs on a person then he was, and what he felt on this kid, he needed a second opinion.

"What?" Gray said leaning over on the other side of the body

"I need you to check this kid's vitals"

Gray leaned over and placed his ear to the boy's chest and gritted his teeth

"He's not breathing!" Gray reassured Laxus's assumption

"_Does that mean we're too late?"_ Laxus didn't want to think about that, this kid had to have some kind of pulse, anything would do at this point

Gray brought two fingers to the kid's wrist and pressed around. Things got quiet for a minute before Gray's eyes shot open

"This kids got a pulse!" he yelled making Laxus ears ring "But it's faint as fuck" he said standing up going back to help Natsu uncover more of the body

Laxus pulled the closer to his

"Come on kid, you got people out there waiting for you" he muttered "I don't know who that girl is to you, sister, girlfriend or whatever, but you can't die on her"

Laxus only ever had a couple of people in his life and knew that if he disappeared, that they would get over it eventually. He messed up his life a long time ago, but this kid had the whole world in front of him. And dammit, Laxus would do whatever it took to make sure this kid got back to it

Natsu pushed a large amount of rubble out of the way and gasped at what he say

"Aye!" he shouted grabbing both Laxus and Gray's attention

"This kid's foot is stuck under something huge" he said trying to lift it himself to no avail "Gray! Come and help me lift this thing up"

Gray ran over and the both of them gave a big tug and with their combined strength, were able to lift and toss the heavy object to the side. The foot they found underneath the object was twisted and swollen, the white skin was replaced with purple and black spots.

"Man, that's gotta hurt" Natsu said cringing at the condition of the foot

Gray didn't say anything but walked back over to Laxus and checkd the vitals again for any changes

"The kid still isn't breathing" Gray said through gritted teeth "But his pulse is a little faster"

Laxus gripped the boy tighter and looked at Gray "What now?"

Gray pondered for a minute "The smart thing now is to perform, CPR. Get him breathing again, then get him to the ambulance quick as possible"

"Not it!" Natsu said raising his hand

"Really" Gray said giving Natsu an annoyed grin

"What" Natsu whined "Lucy would never forgive me, if I kissed another person"

"You're worried about that now!"

"If it's not a big deal then why won't you do it?"

Gray didn't respond, just looked away sheepishly

"Exactly"

"It's not that I won't do it… it's just"

"Just what"

"Umm, Hey!" Gray said his face brighting up "I've got an idea, what about Laxus"

Laxus looked at the both of them like they were crazy "What about me?"

"Yeah, you can do it Laxus" Natsu egged on "You're used to putting your mouth to foreign things"

Laxus could have sworn her heard a blood vessel pop in his head. He looked down to the boy in his arms and his eyes drifted to his lips. He had to admit, this kid did have soft looking lips, even if they were covered him blood and dirt.

Laxus groaned before placing the body back on the ground, he opened the mouth carefully and stared down into the deep chasm that he was about to explore.

"Your breath better be clean" he said inching closer the kids' lips.

"I can't believe he's about to do it"

"Quick! Take a picture"

"I don't have me phone"

"Dammit! Do you think you have time—"

"Would you two, shut the hell up" Laxus screeched making Natsu and Gray cringe

This was heard enough without those two idiots, distracting him. Laxus peered down at the boy again before sighing.

He did say anything to save the kid

With his one hand, Laxus titled his head back and connected his mouth with the kids. He breathed air into the body for about 5 seconds and then started the pumping. He pumped three times before repeating the breathing process. After about 3 more times, Laxus placed his head on the kids' chest,

…Nothing

Laxus clinched his mouth before repeating the process over a couple of more time

"_Come on, breath dammit!"_ He thought placing his ear to the boy's chest again

…

…

..Bump…

Laxus eyes widened, did he just hear?

….Bump…

…Bump…

The kid took a big breath before he started to cough and splutter

"The kids breathing" Laxus yelled

"Alright! Way to go" Gray congratulated Laxu on his job well done

"I guess all those late night pick up, payed off" Natsu joked

Laxus ignored his flamed brained friend and took the safety blanket out of his bag and carefully wrapped the boy in it before carefully cradling him in his arms. This kid was surprisingly light for someone his size

"Alright, let's get out of here" Laxus said heading for the door "I don't want to be here any longer then I have to be"

It only took them a moment to get back out to the front, the bystander population seemed to double as they were in the building. Laxus walked toward the ambulance when the girl from earlier ran up to him, or more so, the body that he was carrying

"Tomo!" she shrieked when she saw the condition he was in. She placed her head and his chest and started to sob uncontrollably. Laxus could understand how she felt, but the time that she was having her break down, as time that this kid could be getting the help he needed

"Look" he started trying to sound more compassionate then annoyed "The longer you stand here sulking, the less time this kid has to get help"

She looked at Laxus with wet surprised blue eyes. Her eyes told him that she hadn't expected to be spoken to like that, but that he was right

She reluctantly stepped to the side and someone came over and held her while Laxus carried the kid to the ambulance. When he got close, Cana ran over and gasped when she saw the body

"You guys actually found someone" she said genuinely surprised

"Yeah" Laxus grunted as he placed the body on the ambulance stretcher

Before they closed the door, Laxus spoke out

"Aye" he shouted catching the paramedics off guard "Make sure, you take care of him, alright"

They looked at each other confused before nodding at Laxus and closing the doors. The ambulance soon sped off into the distance

"You better stay alive, kid" Laxus muttered under his breath

* * *

The whole trying to describe Tomo without saying his name was really difficult, so going from boy to kid was a little sketchy because I keep wanting to say kids or boy's or whatever so sorry about that.

But they kissed!(ish), and there's more to come

So please R&R


	6. Chapter 6

And here's the next chapter of the story! I know that I've been tantalizing you all with the eventual meeting of the to main characters, but it's coming soon trust me. I have the next chapter ready but have to do some proofreading before I submit. I also have a CPE later today so I'll either post before I leave or when I get back, but it will be today. But until then,

On with the story!

* * *

Chapter 6:

The first thing that I saw when I opened my eyes for the first time, was a bright blinding light. I cringed and shielded my eyes. My eye sight was blurry at first but soon began to clear up, the sound of machines beeping and the clock ticking filled the room.

"Ahh, glad you see you finally awake" a voice said

I turned my head and there standing over me was a tall elderly woman with pink hair tied up into a bun. She was looking over at the machines and wrote down something on the clip board that she was carrying

"I must say, I didn't expect you to make it" she said honestly, chuckling to herself "But stranger things have happened"

Okay, I have no idea what was going on but one thing was for sure, this woman had a morbid sense of humor

"_Where am I?"_ I croaked out. Oh my god! Was that my voice, it sounded like a cross between a hoarse frog and a dying wolf, all scratchy and no tone

The woman cringed at the sound of my voice "I will explain everything but _please,_ refrain from talking with that horrid voice, at least while I'm in the room" she muttered the last part

I rolled my eyes at the woman irritably before she cleared her throat and started talking

"For reference, I am doctor Porlyusica"

Doctor! With those bed side manners, I'm sure that she's been told that before with the way she was looking at me

"And for the record, I have been told about my poor bedside manners, but I could care less" she said acting like she had just read my mind before continuing "You are in the hospital recovering from 3rd and 2nd degree burns on majority of your body, which are healing quite adequately, if I do say so myself" she sounded like she was patting herself on the back for doing her job, weird woman

"Also, your left foot was crushed by a fallen support beam and crushed severely"

My eyes widened and she noticed the look of horror on my face

"Stop looking at me like that!" she snapped at me "It's not as bad as you think, luckily, it was only sprained and is swollen, a cast had to be administered but you should recover full mobility in a couple of week, a month if necessary"

I wanted to ask her what about my dancing, but she seemed like the type of person who didn't like to answer a lot of question, but I had a lot of questions and I figured one more wouldn't hurt

"_What about me dancing" _I managed to croak out

She gave me a look that said, _didn't I tell you not to speak,_

"Dancing!" she gawked "What do I look like? I'm a doctor not a choreographer if it's dancing you want then talk to someone else" she narrowed her eyes at me and turned around so I could only see her back "Besides, I told you a couple of weeks, a month if necessary. I do not like to repeat myself"

"Now, get some rest, I will check on you later" she said exiting the room and closing the door behind her

When she left, I laid my head back and was met with a soft pillow. I pulled both my arms from under the covers and saw that they were bandaged all the way from my wrist to my elbow, maybe even farther than that. I leaned up to get a better look at my foot but was met with excruciating pain shooting up my abdomen. Laying back down and not wanting to go through that again, I settled for trying to lift my leg up, an sure enough, I had a tight restraint wrapped around my leg, it felt heavy and clunky but the pain was acceptable.

I lay in my bed staring up at the ceiling, a thousand different questions ran through my head,

"What had happened after I went back in?"

"Was Chelia, okay?"

"How did I get to the hospital?"

"How long have I been out?"

"What happened with everyone?"

Each question only managed to give me an even bigger headache then I already had, and to make me even more tired.

I sunk deeper into the pillow and let the sleep consume me

XOXOXOXOXOXOXO

The blinding light coming in from the window woke me up, if it hadn't been for the protection of the shutters, then the small room would have been filled with light. I turned my body grudgingly to block it out and reached to pull the covers over my body, but stopped when I felt a piece of plastic. I glanced down and groaned when I saw the IV attached to my wrist, I wanted nothing more to just rip the thing out but decided against it.

I heard a knock at the door and before I could respond, the door opened to revel my doctor

"Good, you're awake, this makes me job a lot easier"

I wondered what she meant before she walked over to my arm, and none to gently, ripped the IV out of it. I hollered in pain but it came out all croaky

"Don't be a baby" she said rolling eyes before replacing my bandages. As much as I didn't want to, while she was busy rolling my skin up with fresh tape, I glanced over at the previous ones; they were covered in a yellowish-green substance and dried blood, the sight was enough to make my stomach do back flips. I turned my head and focused on the woman that was, roughly, tending to me.

"Okay" she sighed as she placed the roll of bandages back into a white box with a red cross on it and closed it "I'll be back later with your medications" she said getting up from the bed "But for now, you have visitors, I'll show them in" She walked out of the room but left the door cracked open

"_Visitors_" I thought, how could possibly be here?

As if hearing my thoughts, the door burst open and the room was soon filled with colorful balloons, different arrangements of flowers and a, very large, stack of what I presumed were get well cards. Holding said items were Chelia, Chise, Orie and Nobu, my mom, dad and Juno.

As soon as he got in the room and saw that I was awake, Juno ran and jumped into my bed, narrowly missing my bandaged foot

"Tomo!" he screeched making my ears ring

He wrapped his arms around my bandaged chest and it stung a little but I decided to let him have his moment

"Look whose back from the dead" Chise replied sarcastically as she placed one of the flower arrangements on the stand next to my bed "And here I thought the tragically boring tale of Tomoyashi, came to a dramatic conclusion" she sneered looking at me and I stuck my tongue out at her playfully

"Huh! Chise" Orie gasped as she shoved the balloons that she was carrying into Nobu's arms and ran over to my bed, her weight caused the bed to sunk in and she roughly grabbed my head and roughly thrusted it into her, admittedly large, bosom

"Here is our friend laid up in the hospital, horribly disfigured and all you can do is make jokes, have you no shame" Orie continued to push my face deeper into her breasts making it harder to breath, I started thrashing

"Uhm, Orie" Nobu spoke up meekly "Tomo's kind of—"

Orie looked down and saw that I had trouble breathing and she quickly released me. I pulled my face out from between her breast and started taking big breaths of air, my face had become flushed, I glanced over to Chise who simply rolled her eyes and looked away. She looked more than just her average irritated, she actually looked jealous

"Here, these are for you" Nobu said placing the balloons in my lap causing my line of sight to become blocked "Ms. Cortez also wanted to say, get better soon" he said taking a seat on the bed next to Orie making it sink lower

"OH!" Juno sat up and took a neatly folded up piece of paper out of his pocket and started to unfold it "I drew this for you" he said excited as he shoved the piece of paper in my hands. On the picture was a poorly drawn version of what I think was supposed to be me and him underneath a rainbow holding hands, it read

"Get butter soon!" with the u crossed out to an e

Spelling mistakes aside, I chuckled at the sentiment and patted him on the head. I looked to the door and saw Chelia standing there, she was being so quiet that I had forgotten that she was even in the room, she was normally the one making all the noise so to see her like this, something must have been bugging her.

As if feeling that I was staring at her, she turned her head and forced a smile in my direction, I smiled weakly back at her and knew that we were going to have one big emotional talk later

My father cleared his throat and everyone in the room in the room looked at him. The gruff expression on his face told everyone that he wanted them to leave

"Umm, Juno!" Orie exclaimed faking a smile "How's about we go find some ice cream for,Tomo?" Orie didn't wait for his response as she peeled him off of me and grabbed Nobu's hand before heading out the door. My dad stepped to the side and allowed them to exit, everyone else soon followed until it was just me, my dad and mom

The room became dead silent except for the constant ticking of the clock on the wall. My mom was leaned up against the wall and my dad was just standing there, they were looking at me, staring at me like a child who had just got caught with his hand in the cookie jar. It wasn't until my dad made a move that everything seemed to come back to life

"So, it seems like you're doing better" he inquired as he looked around the room "Everything, um, is alright, right?" he asked with inquisitive eyes

I didn't know how to respond to that; I mean, I was layed up in a hospital bed with burns covering majority of my body and a sprained foot, how do you think I was doing?

"John, he's in a hospital bed with 2nd and 3rd degree burns, how do you think he's doing?" My mom rolled her eyes and walked over, he heels clicking on the tile floor as she took a seat at the foot of my bed, being careful not to step on anything or sit for that matter

"It was a legit question" he said running a frustrated hand through his gray and brown hair before taking a seat on the small sofa that I was just noticing for the first time "I mean, we're paying extra for this room. I want to make sure that our money is being used wisely, comfort isn't cheap"

My mom glared over in my dad's direction which meant,_ stop talking,_ in that language that only married people could understand. She reached a gentle hand over and ran it across my face, I inadvertently twitched making her stop halfway and pull back with a sigh

"At least let us know if you're comfortable" she said with pleading eyes

I looked back and between my parents, this was the first time that they were actually paying a sizable amount of time worrying about me. My relationship I had with my parents consisted of a couple of things, 1) Conversing on a minimal amount of time for the momentary minute that they were home, 2) Making sure that there was something, actually edible, in the kitchen for breakfast and dinner and sometimes a light snack, but they were in charge of that. A goodbye wave in the morning and a good night at dawn, everything else was just…unnecessary

My replay to them was a slight nod, the doctor comment on my voice had kind of made me self-conscious about it

"Good" my dad said hopping up and dusting off his slacks "Everything seems to be in order, so" he looked at his wrist watch and then at me mom, tapping on it impatiently "Can we—"he motioned sweeping motion toward the door

"John" my mom warned in a serious tone

"But, Mariam" he said in a calm/agitated voice "I have a meeting in 45 minutes on the other side of town and then after that—"he was stopped when my mom jumped out from off the bed, making it creak

"John!" she said through gritted teeth

Uh-oh, I knew what was coming next

"Can I see you outside?"

That was my mom's way of making herself feel better for what was about to happen, she figured that if we couldn't see them, then that would make the arguing less harsh for me and Juno. He grunted before they walked outside into the hallway, the door creaked shut before it began

The muffled shouting, the,_ all you care is about work,_ and then the ever so popular, _you see how hard it is being me,_ before the shuffling of the feet, and then the sound of muffled cries and the high pitched voice before the ever so exciting climax of one of them walking out, and the other walking back in. However, because it was a public affair, they both walked back in with my mom looking seriously, for the sake of the children I'll say peeved off; with my dad walking back in with his hand shoved into his pockets

There was a knock at the door, and who else but my doctor to make this family affair even more entertaining

"Hello there" she said walking in past the hand shake that my dad had offered and past my mother who opened her mouth to ask a question "I am doctor, Porlyusica, I will be your son's primary appointed care taker, and so on and so forth" she said as she rapidly flipped through some pages on her clipboard "If you have any questions, please ask them now"

My mother opened her mouth but was once again cut off

"Good no questions, let's move on" she said flipping to another page

"Your son, T…m..oishi, what kind of name is this?" she muttered to herself as she squinted at the paper

"Tomoyahsi" my mother corrected

"Right…that, anyway, he has sustained some serious burns on majority of his body which seem to be healing averagely for the degree they are in. He should regain full mobility of his foot within the coming month, and 40 percent of the toxic smoke has been filtered from his lungs, all in all" she pulled the board from her face and looked at my parents "He's lucky to be alive"

My mother cleared her throat authoritatively and the doctor sighed "Yes, what is it?"

Ignoring the tone the doctor used my mom asked her question "Yes, when will he be cleared to come home?"

The doctor looked over her clipboard "We are still worried about the amount of toxin still in his system, however, if everything checks out then he should be cleared by tomorrow"

"And what about school" my mother continued

"Whenever you feel he's ready, anything else" the doctor edged on trying to get all the question over with

"Yes, as anyone told you about your poor bedside manners" my mother said glaring the woman down

The doctor was however unfazed "Yes…Yes they have, if you have a complaint then please feel free to fill out the paperwork at the front desk" she said it like she had it rehearsed, which apparently she had

"Don't worry, I will" my mother said sneering in the woman's direction

The doctor walked out of the room not paying attention to my mother's "threats"

"Who does that woman think she is!" my mother gawked "Oh, when I get done she's going to-NO! The hospital's going to be issuing a public apology" my mother seized as my dad started rubbing her shoulder, making her take a seat on the sofa.

My mom worked as the spokeswoman for the Magnolia Gazette and national town news, so anything that's relevant in Magnolia, new places, failing business, who slept with who in what position, all this stuff was her businesses. And needless to say everywhere she went, she was treated like she was the Queen of England, which I guess made me Prince William and Juno, Prince Harry. Where that left my dad, I don't know

"Calm down, Mariam" my dad cooed as he continued to rub her shoulders soothingly, there was a knock at the door, had the doctor come back for round 2?

"Come in" my dad called, looking like he was thinking the same thing I was

When the door creaked open, the air was tense until we saw that it was Juno, Orie and Nobu

"Is it safe to come in?" she whispered

My dad walked over to the door and pulled it open, making Orie stumble backwards but skillfully being caught her significant other

"Gee, thanks babe" she said patting him on the head as he pushed her back up on her feet

Juno came in caring an armful amount of juice boxes, he dropped them all on the bed, presenting them like a prize

"Look what I found" he said climbing back into my bed and rummaging through the different colored boxes, he picked up a yellow one and stick the straw in before shoving it toward my mouth

"Drink" he ordered, I softly shrugged to myself and sucked on the straw, the yellow liquid went through the tubed and splashed into my dry mouth, I was instantly hit with the taste of pineapples. I gave a thumbs up to Juno who beamed up at me and gave me the bottle to hold as he began to pass around different colored boxes to people

"Were did you guys get these" my dad said eyeing the purple box he was handed suspiciously before downing it

"Oh, there was a cart outside" Juno said sitting on my bed and sticking a straw into a blue box for himself

"Did you ask first?" my mom chimed in

Juno shook his head

"We made sure to ask" Nobu said crushing the box in his hand before tossing it in the trash

"Yeah, the lady said take as many as needed" Orie said smiling as she slurped up the last of her drink

"And, all of these were necessary" my mom said dropping her box in the trash

"Well, Juno didn't know what flavor Tomo wanted, so he got two of each" Nobu commented

Juno took his mouth away from his box and looked up at me, I knew what he was waiting for, if there was one thing I resented at this point, it was teaching him manners

I sighed before taking the box down from my mouth

"_Thank…You"_ I had to take a momentary pause because I thought that it would cushion the impact. All their eyes widened and my dad chocked on his box, evident from the pounding on his chest

"You sound like a robot!" Juno cheered "Cool"

"Oh dear" my mom placed her hands in her hands and just shook it slowly

All I needed now was for the doctor to come back in the room and tell us that we were making too much noise, to make this moment just perfect

XOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Laxus leaned back in his swivel chair and looked at the clock on the wall for what seemed like the 10th time now. He had approximately 15 more minutes until he could leave, a minute early and Erza would have his head.

Laxus let out a tired yawn and stretched his arms out, it had been a practicality quiet day and the only calls that they had received ranged from cats being stuck in trees, to small barbecue fires that a regular house owned fire extinguisher could have taken care of. Natsu jumped at the chance to take care of each assignment, and Laxus wasn't going to argue with him.

The clock ticked again and he looked up for the 11th time, it always seemed that whenever it was time for him to go, the time would go even slower making the agonizing wait even more annoying

The door creaked open and in walked a half dressed Gray, Laxus didn't acknowledge his presence but continued to stare at the clock

"Don't you know the old saying "A watched pot never boils" Gray

"Don't you know the saying, shut the hell up" he growled back

"Someone's touchy" Gray said as took a seat "By the way, we got hospital report about that kid"

Laxus would be lying if he said that he hadn't thought about that incident since it happened. It's been all over the news, reports swarmed in about the fire that devastated a school gymnasium and about a student being severely injured. The thought of what would have happened to that kid if they hadn't found him still plagued the back of his mind

"Oh yeah, how is the brat doing?" Laxus asked trying not to sound interested

"He's doing a lot better, should be released sometime this week"

"That's nice" Laxus was relieved to hear that the kid was doing a lot better, he had to admit then when they found him in the building he looked worse for wear, he thought that the kid wouldn't make it but he was happy that everything worked out

"Think we should send a care package?"

"Psh, up to you, just keep me out of it" Laxus said counting the seconds he had left on his shift

"Alright, I'll make sure to sign your name with dotted hearts" Gray said ducking as Laxus chucked a mug at his head

"Whoa" Cana said as she opened the door narrowly being hit in the head by said mug, before it smashed into the wall "I'm not cleaning that up"

"It's almost noon, shouldn't you be intoxicated by now" Laxus joked making Cana flick him off

"Bite me" she sneered "I'm actually going out later, you guys should come"

"Can't" Gray waved his hand "Gotta stay after for something Erza has me doing" he groaned and slamed his head on the table

"Sucks to be you" she looked at Laxus "What about you, your gramps said he hasn't seen you in a while"

Laxus sniggered his teeth "I see him every other day" Laxus scratched the back of his head "I don't know, maybe"

"Well whatever, I'm getting my drink on regardless"

Laxus looked up at the bottem less pit of a woman that he called his coworker and wanted to say something before his cell phone rung. He checked it and saw that the timer that he had set for work schedule had gone off

Laxus stood up and grabbed his jacket form the back and the chair, he walked out of the office with a small wave and goodbye. He decided that he would make a quick trip before going home that day

XOXOXOXOXOXOXO

It had been about 2 hours since everyone had left, Orie and Nobu had filled me in on the things that I was missing at school. Apparently because the fire wasn't as bad as the school officials had first thought, they decided that they would just sanction off the gym for the rest of the school year to be renovated. That meant for the students that school would be out for the rest of the week but would report back on the following Monday.

When they told me that I had been out for about three day now, I couldn't' believe it. Being asleep, it felt like everything only happened for a couple of hours

I read over all the cards that they had brought me, the ranged from "_Getter better soon_" to _"Did you know that only 69 percent of bun victims survive, you should be happy!"_ I even got some from the people that worked with my parents. I have to admit though, I've never received this much attention before, and I was going to miss it when I left the hospital, but anything was better than being in this bed all day with a moody doctor.

There was a knock at the door, expecting it to be my doctor I didn't say anything. However, opening the door was definitely not my doctor, Chelia walked in looking apprehensive, she was carrying a large bouquet of bright yellow flowers. We stared at each other for what seemed like forever before she crept over to my bed and pulled a chair up

"Uhm, here" she said quickly placing the flowers into my hands

She started to fidget uncomfortably in her chair and I wanted nothing more than to just jump out of bed and hold her close to me, but given my current circumstance. Even more time passed by and the tension in the air continued to get thicker

"I want to know one thing" she said looking down at the ground from her seat "Why?"

"_Why what"_

"Why you went back in like an idiot!" she screamed at me, she finally looked up and then when I saw that her eyes were beginning to water

"_I couldn't find you"_ I screamed/croaked back, which turns out was a bad idea because my throat started to itch making me wheeze. Chelia jumped up and patted my back in a soothing motion for a moment. After I was done, she sat back in her seat

"You couldn't find me and your solution was to run back in" she said still shaking her head "That makes no sense to me, what am I some freakin damsel in distress that needs to be saved all the time, I can take care of myself" she got out as the tears started to fall

I looked down at the flowers in my hand, trying to distract myself from what was going on. I knew that we were going to have this talk eventually, but didn't think that it would happen so soon.

"When they brought you out from the gym" she stopped herself before continuing "I didn't know what to do, I saw you hurt and bleeding and thought that maybe that was going to be my last time seeing you" she bit her bottom lip to the point I thought she was going to draw blood

"I-I can't lose you, Tomo" she said taking my hand and bring her forehead down to it "Your my best friend and I love you" she started to softly sob into my hand and I could fell the could wet drops of her tears as they fell. I reached my other hand over and softly caressed her hair

"_Me too"_

She looked up from my hand surprised

"_When I thought that you were in trouble, I couldn't help myself"_ By this time, I could feel myself crying. The way that we both worried about each other, the lengths that we would go to help one another, the tears that we shed, everything only seemed to prove one point; we loved each other unconditionally

She reached up and we wrapped our arms around each other in a warm embrace, when we let go it was as if the tension in the room sudden disappeared and was replaced with a bright warmness

"Okay!" Chelia said wiping the tears out of her eyes "Now that all of that drama is out of the way, how have you been?"

I explained to her all about the crazy doctor, my parent's arguments, Juno's obsession with my robot voice, and the boringness of being laid up in a hospital bed

"Wow, that's crazy" she said laughing at my misfortune, causing me to roll my eyes. I looked down at the bouquet of flowers and took a big whiff, the aroma of sweet honey and a warm relief washed over my body

"_We're did you get the flowers?"_ I asked as I continued to inhale their sweet smell

"Oh I didn't get those" she said "Those were at the front desk when I came to visit you"

I stopped for a moment and pondered, who would send flowers to me. I looked over them for some kind of identification, but only found a small card

"Getter better soon, kid" signed:

_- Don't worry about it_

* * *

Who could have possibly sent Tomo those flowers? (wink, wink)

Anyway, please R&R your thoughts


	7. Chapter 7

(Gasp! He's not dead!) Yeah, sorry its been like forever since I lasted posted anything. It's been a mixture of looking for a part time job, trying to enjoy my summer while it last before I start community college in a couple of weeks. (Sigh) Darn me for trying to get my education! But here's the next chapter. Chapter 8 is in the works and should be uploaded soon, but until then:

On with the story!

* * *

Chapter 7:

Laxus groaned as he tossed and turned in his bed as the alarm continued to blare off. He reached over on his night stand, looking for the snooze button inadvertently knocking over something which smashed on the ground with a hard thud. Ignoring the mess that he would have to wipe up later, Laxus continued his hunt for the button when the alarm suddenly stopped.

Laxus, letting out a sigh of relief, sunk back into his bed when his alarm soon started up again. With a reluctant sigh, Laxus roughly grabbed the alarm clock and pulled it from the outlet socket before chucking it toward the wall. Laxus figured that he either had another mess to clean up or a hole in the wall to patch up, but he wasn't going to find out until he got at least another three hours of sleep.

And just when it felt like he was going to get back to sleep, the door bell started to buzz. Using his pillow as a silencer, Laxus tried to block as much of the sound out as possible hopefully whoever was at the door would eventually give up and go home, however, the door assailant continued to bang on the door with all their might. Realizing that sleep wasn't going to happen, Laxus rolled out of his very comfortable bed, carefully walking over the mess that he would have to clean up later, dragging himself down his unnecessarily long hallway to his front door.

He snatched the door open and was met with bright sunlight, causing him to shield his eyes

"Bout time you answered" Evergreen strided in, Laxus stepped to the side letting her in and was about to close the door when a hand stopped him

"Hey, that hurts me feelings" a loud laugh cut through the air, a tall man with black and blue hair styled into a Mohawk pushed the door open

"My bad" Laxus said letting a yawn escape his mouth as he let Bickslow in

Both, Evergreen and Bickslow found themselves in his living room, Evergreen occupied the love seat as Bickslow stretched out on the sofa

Laxus's real apartment was, for all of one word, a penthouse. He lived in one of the richest complex's that bordered Magnolia. He lived at the top floor, five rooms, two and a half bath, inside and outside pool, fantastic view of the whole city from his porch. Laxus had only let one of his "guests" ever stay at his real house, and he caught her in the dead of night trying to make off with some of his valuables. The only time that he ever allowed them to enter his house was when he knew for a fact that they were leaving right after they were done.

"You know, when someone says make yourself at home, they don't mean it literally "he said scratching the back of his head with one hand as the other was showed in his pocket

"Well" Evergreen chuckled as she crossed her legs, making Laxus roll his eyes

"Don't be like that" Bickslow grinned "You know that you're glad to see us"

"Tch, whatever, why are you guys even here" Laxus said taking a seat on the opposite side of Evergreen "Shouldn't you be at work?"

"You know I don't work" Evergreen chimed in

"Not you"

Bickslow let out a menacing cackle as he watched the two bicker

Laxus had known Bickslow for as long as he could remember, the man had a weird sense of humor but was good person to be around, most of the time. Combined with his over active hyperness and skill with those little creepy puppet things that he carried with him everywhere, Bickslow earned a living as a performer, children's birthday parties were his main source of income.

"Oh, the party that I was working got cancelled" he said slumping further on the sofa

"So you both came to bother me on my day off, great" Laxus commented walking into his kitchen and fishing for something to drink, finally deciding on a half empty bottle of water

"Well, it was either that or have this idiot at my house all day entertaining me with his puppets" Evergreen said shuddering at the though

"Don't pretend you would have enjoyed it" he said giving her a crooked smile

"I'd rather give Laxus a blow—"

"Whoa, whoa. Keep me out of this" he said downing the last of his drink

"Thanks for offering" Evergreen said annoyed

"You know where everything is" he said tossing the bottle behind him not caring where it landed

"I'm surprised that your house isn't breaming with trash by now" she said flipping her hair over her shoulder

"Then why don't you clean it?"

"Because, manual labor isn't for the beautiful"

"Then I guess you shouldn't have a problem" Bickslow commented earning him a heel to the face

"So what's the plan" Laxus asked ignoring his half bleeding friend on the floor

"Well, I figured that we could do some shopping, then hit that cute little Italian place down town, and then—"

"Let me guess, you want me to pay for this little excursion" he eyed his friend up and down

"I had hoped so" Laxus sighed already knowing the answer to his question

"Fine" he said pushing himself up "Let me just take a shower"

"Make it quick, time is your money"

"Yeah, yeah" Laxus said walking over his slumped friend "Meanwhile, do something about him"

"No promises"

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

"And then, Zancrow fumbled the ball, but get this, he drops it on the 45 yard line. I mean, who does that"

"Apparently he did" I said half listening to Chelia regale the story about the football game the other day, which I was fortune enough to have missed out on because of my little hospital visit. It had been about two days since I had been back home. The house was empty except for me, Juno was down the street as a friend's house and my parent's where at work, as usual. My mom was reluctant to leave but decided to when my dad reminded her of all the work she had to do. She made Juno promise her that he would check up on me every couple of minutes, to which he puffed his chest and out proclaimed

"Commander J is on the case!"

I chuckled at the memory of him running down the street just to run back and see if I needed anything

"Are you laughing at me" Chelia seized on the other side of the phone

"No, just…thinking is all"

"I'm so happy that you voice is back to normal" she giggled

"Me and you both"

Luckily, the antibiotics that the doctor had me doped up on had kicked in to the point where my throat didn't hurt as bad but just throbbed. It had thankfully stopped me from talking like, as Juno had put it, a mega-super-awesome robot commander

"Oh and guess what" she said dragging out each syllable as she spoke. I could picture her now, all giddy with excitement over something that couldn't have been really important

"What" I breathed out

"Shima said "Hey"" she purred out

I could feel myself physical shudder when she said that

"Oh….how nice"

"Yeah" I could feel her bouncing off the wall of her room as she spoke "Said that since his Tomo couldn't be there—"

"He did not say that!"

"Cross my heart, word for word" she pledged "Told the whole team that he was going to pay you a visit"

I groaned and threw my head back, that's when a thought hit me "Hey, do you think it was him who sent me those flowers?"

Chelia got quiet for a minute "I thought about that, but why wouldn't he put his name"

"Good point" I breathed a silent sigh of relief. I don't know why but, the thought of having Shima sending me those flowers kind of took the preternatural essence out of them. When I look at the flowers, a sense of warmth ness washes over me, like I could wrap myself in them and feel safe

"Anyway, I thought that he would stop by the hospital to see you but since he didn't, he might make a house visit later. I would prepare if I were you"

I let out a loud laugh "He doesn't even know where I live" the line got quiet "Chelia" the line continued to be quiet and I could hear soft whistling on the other side

"Chelia" I warned "He doesn't know where I live, right"

The whistling turned to soft humming

"Chelia!"

"Yes, my dear" I could hear her stifling in a laugh

"You didn't!" I screamed

"Why, whatever could you possibly mean" she said in her fake innocent voice. Just then, there was a knock at the front door followed by a couple of doorbell rings.

"_Please be Juno_" I repeated over and over in my head as I grabbed the crutch on the side of my bed and used it to sneak my way over to my window and peer outside of it. There, standing on my front porch, suit and all, was the object of my discontent

"Hey, what's going on?" I heard Chelia scream as I crutched my way over to my bed. Without thinking, I placed the crutch awkwardly on the rug that lined my room and managed to slip and stumble, hitting the ground with a hard thud; So much for trying to hide

The doorbell continued to ring profusely and gave up on trying to pretend I wasn't home. I reached over on my bed and grabbed my cellphone

"What's all that noise? Are you okay? Answer me dangit! Ignoring all her question I pulled myself up

"I'll call you back" I said before hanging up and slumping back to the ground. Getting up and carefully dragging myself down the stairs, I made my way to the door. I reached to turn the knob but pulled back, shaking my head I realized that if I didn't face him now, then he would just go to my parents and cause even more problems. Gripping the doorknob with all the courage I could muster and swung it open

"Ah, Tomo" he said beaming down at me

"Hi, Shima" I said trying to sound at least a little pleasant

Shima Nohiro was basically a blonde haired version of Bear Grylls that played football (Wait, did Bear Grylls play football?) He was the Quarterback for the Sterling Red Wolfs, and one of the most openly sexual person that I had ever met. He came out at the game against MPA freshmen year, there was even a YouTube video that got a very sizable amount of views. His parents owned a couple of business in town and placed a flyer all around preaching

"_Our son is gay. Hip Hip-Hooray!"_

It was the weirdest thing that ever hit Magnolia, but everyone decided just to run with it. Whenever someone would say something slick about him, all he had to do was tower over them and they instantly clamped up. The dude was 6, 8, an admirably masculine build, and a great personality. However though…

"I brought these for you" he said shoving a bouquet of roses toward my body. I looked down and then back up at him, he finally caught on that I had a crutch

"Oh sorry, I didn't realize" he started to chuckle nervously and I sighed before snatching the flowers out of his hand with my free one

"Thanks" I grumbled

We stood there for a minute, he ran a frustrated hand through his short blond locks and I sighed before moving

"Wanna come inside?"

His whole demeanor changed and he shook his head a little too eagerly. He walked in stopping to take his shoes off before walking and siting on the sofa. I crutched myself over to the love seat on the opposite side of the room and placed the roses on the table

"Those will probably need to be put in some water" he commented

"Yeah…I'll do that later" I said trying not to look at him

"Um, I heard something stumbling earlier…Is everything alright?"

"Oh yeah, that was just me…not used to this yet" I said waving the crutch around

"I see, how long you have to have it on?"

"Couple of weeks"

"Oh that's good. I mean! Good that you only have to have it for a short time, not that you have…I didn't mean to, you know"

"I got it" I said wanting him to stop babbling

He coughed nervously before tugging on his tie

"What's with the get up?"

"Oh this" he said looking down at his attire "I didn't know if your parents were home or not, and I wanted to make a good impression" him saying that made me arch an eyebrow

"Too much?"

"Just a little"

He groaned and hung his head

I shifted a little on the love seat to place my casted leg in a more comfortable position. This conversation was beginning to become tedious, as was his presence

"Why exactly are you here again"

His shocked expression turned from one of scorn to concern

"When I heard about the fire at MPA I started to worry about you, and when you didn't show up at the game, I kind of put two and two together." He looked up at me and I couldn't help but stare back, those green eyes of his were full of compassion and longing, like those of a little puppy

"I worry about you, Tomo" his voice dripping with emotion

I could feel my heart skip a beat as he said that. He always had to say those mushy things to me

"Well, thanks" I mumbled feeling myself become slightly flustered

The relationship between Shima and I could be compared to that of a cat and mouse, with me being the mouse in this scenario. When the word spread around that I liked to, how you say, pick my berries from the other side of the fence. He had the great idea that we should go berry picking together. A slew of emotions hit me that day but one thing continuously stuck in my mind

Hell No.

It's not that he isn't a good person, it was just that he came on so strong and it kind of made me uncomfortable; That, and a whole other bunch of things that just made my head hurt, so to avoid myself of that headache I decided keep Shima at a distance, which doesn't help because the boy is just so freaking persistent

Suddenly the door bell rung and a knock soon followed it

"_That'll be Juno_" I thought about to get up when Shima suddenly jumped up

"I'll get it" he said running over to the door, I sat back down and could hear the creak of the front door as it opened

"To—mo?" I could hear Juno break my name up as recognized that I wasn't the one to open the door. The next thing that I could hear was a scream before Juno bolted into the living room

"Intruder!"

He grabbed the nearest thing to him, which happened to be my crutch, and ran back to the front door, the next thing that could be heard was the yelps of a 18 year old boy as he was unmercifully beaten by a small 8 year old

XOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Laxus stopped as he pulled up in front of the Fairy Tail bar, after spending the whole day with Evergreen and Bickslow, he desperately needed a drink. Laxus pressed his hand on the door when someone grabbed his attention

"Laxus" the voice called out to him

Laxus pulled his hand back ad looked down to see his grandfather walking up to him

"Oh, hey gramps" he said greeting the short man

"It's nice to see you too" Makarov said beaming up at him

Laxus had to admit, it had felt like a long time since had last seen his grandfather, but with everything that had happened recently it was really neither one of their faults

"Yeah" Laxus nodded to the man placing his hand back on the door

"I head that you rescued a kid the other day, I'm very proud of you"

Laxus sniggered his teeth "Whatever, it was just work, nothing to big"

"Not to big!" Makarov jumped up and smacked Laxus on the back of the head

"Ow, what was that for" Laxus said rubbing his newly formed lump

"Laxus, you saved a child's life, because of what you and the others did, that kid can grow up to make the world a better place" Makarov preached as he tugged on tugged on his mustache and nodded knowingly

"If you say so" Laxus said finally pushing the door open

The pair walked in and instantly caught sight of Gajeel carrying some boxes while a petite sized girl stood next to him

"I don't think he's- oh!" she stopped when she saw them

Laxus started the girl for a moment before tunng his attention to Gajeel, the tall man narrowed his eyes at Laxus, causing him to smirk in return

"Laxus," Gajeel growled at the man before dropping the boxes and walking over, he stood directly on front of Laxus face

Laxus chuckled at the man infront of him "Gajeel" he greeted the other man "still mad about the swap I see" he said clearly knowing the answer

"You got it bastard" the man barked

Laxus waved his hand nonchantly "fancy a rematch"

"You're on jerk" Gajeel said with an evil gleam in his eye

"Tonight?"

"Nah, I'm on the early shift tomorrow"

"Ah. Saturday?"

"You're on!"

"Same wager"

"You got it"

Laxus and Gajeel both glared at each other with evil smirks on their faces before shaking hands. Laxus looked behind Gajeel at the blue haired girl, she was talking to his grandpa about something he couldn't hear

"Hey"

"Yeah?"

"That chick over their" Laxus said gesturing to the girl "That's the one you been talking about"

"Yeah" Gajeel said looking over his shoulder grinning "That's shrimp"

"Ah" Laxus really wasn't interested in the girl one way or another, from what he had heard Gajeel already had dibs on her

"Anyway, what the hell are you doing here so early? Taking some tips from Cana"

Gajeel chuckled and Makarov joined in, meanwhile the girl was standing their looking lost, and from what Laxus had been told about her already, that was how she looked most of the time anyway

"Nah, had to help shrimp move her crap" he said jabbing a thumb behind him

Laxus looked around Gajeel at the woman and stared, he could feel her being intimated by his stare

"H-hello!" she said weakly with a little wave

"Yo" Laxus replied nodded at her

Laxus watched as Gejeel walked back over to the woman and said something that apparently infuriated her. He watched as he picked the boxes back up and chuckled as she fumed at him, Laxus felt something tug at him on his insides, suddenly his mission for a drink turned sour

"Anyway, I got go. See ya later Gramps" he said patting the man on the head as he walked by "Gajeel, Shrimp" Laxus waved back at them before exiting the building.

Laxus closed the door to his car and started it up, but as he went to turn the car into the corrective gear something caused him to stop. Laxus didn't know that had gotten into him but watching how Gajeel and that shrimp girl acted around each other caused something to stir up inside of him. The way they flirted without either of them paying attention to it, the in between the line signals that they sent each other made Laxus made at the thought.

Laxus shook his head of the thought "Whatever" he said pulling the car into drive

"I don't feel like going home" he mumbled pulling his phone up and going through his contracts looking for someone to "entertain" that night

XOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Waking up in the middle of the night to pee, normal. Waking up to pee in the middle of the night with a cast, annoying

I pulled myself up and reached for my crutch, using it to walk myself over to my bathroom was a lot more difficult than people thought. Opening the door and pulling myself over to the toilet, I realized that I had another issue to deal with.

Peeing while sitting down had always been a strange sensation to me, but it was the only choice that I had for the time being, unless I wanted a mess of course. After finishing my business and flushing (of course) I walked over to the mirror to wash my hands. As the cool water ran over my hands, I looked up at my reflection in the mirror. It had felt like a long time since I had done that;

There was a scar left on top of my forehead from when I had been buried underneath the rubble. The burns on my body and that scar reminded me that the events that took place actually happened. I remember being in the burning building and then being covered, but everything after that was all a blur. The images of that moment keep repeating themselves over and over in my head. The fear of being trapped, the feeling of almost being dead, all of it caused a cold chill to run down my spine.

But all of that couldn't prepare me for going back to school tomorrow. Just the thought of having to deal with everyone's stares was enough to make my stomach churn. Shaking my head, I continued to stare at myself, I promised that if I got out of that situation alive that I would change myself for the better, do all the things that I would never normally do.

Bending down to turn the water off, some of my hair flung over my shoulder and a strong odor hit my nose, I sniffed around and finally sniffed my hair, the smell of smoke was so strong that it almost knocked my off my feet or rather foot.

Okay, the brand new me will start right after I get this smell out of my hair

XOXOXOXOXOXO

Getting dress was another struggle that I would find out. The cast was so bulky that getting my pants to go up around it was proving to be difficult. After hopping around my room and tripping a couple of time in the process, I was finally dressed. Grabbing my bag and heading down stairs, the smell of something burning suddenly hit my nose and realized that it could only mean one thing, my mom was trying to cook.

Rushing into the kitchen, my mom was desperately fanning over the pot as the smoke continued to spew from it, grabbing a cup of water I quickly douched the pot and turned it off before placing a lid on top of it

Letting a sigh escape my mouth, I glanced over at my mom she looked tired and completely disarray, her hair was sticking out in all directions and the bags under her eyes had bags. She was wrapped up in her bright blue bathrobe

I could hear her muttering something to herself, something about a stupid pot

"Umm" there were a couple of different thing that I could have said at that time, each probably ending up with me getting a death stare, so umm seemed like the simple and least repercuptive (If that's even a word)

"I'll take of things down here so…you…can" she turned her head to look at me and a wave of emotion washed over her face, she sighed before wiping her hands off on her robe

"Don't worry about it" she said "I'll just pick something up on the way" she sounded defeated as she made her way up stairs. I groaned and limped my way into the living room, to my surprise Juno was already in there dressed and flipping through the TV

"Morning" he said not looking in my direction

"Morning" I replied back a little suspicious "You're up early" I commented easing my weight onto the sofa

"Yeah" he said changing the channel to some weird early morning show about the wonders of healthy eating

Okay something was seriously up here, the normally energetic, loud mouth brother that I had come to know was just sitting here, still, well…not being crazy

"Umm, are you feeling okay?"

"Yeah, just a sleepy" he responded nonchalantly continuing to flip through the channels "And a little hungry" he grumbled as he stomach growled

"Oh, do you want me to get you something" I asked about to get up

"Nah" he shrugged "Mom and dad told me not ask you to do anything that wasn't necessary, told me that I need to become "responsible" he air quoted around responsible

I didn't know how to feel when he said that, I part of me was actually surprised that my parents were actually making an effort to worry about my well being, another part of me was worried that maybe Juno was going to take this whole thing to heart and feel over whelmed. That was the one thing I wanted to prevent him from going through

"Juno" I stared sitting up straight "Just because I'm partially impaired" he looked at me with a twisted face "handicap. Doesn't mean that I want you to act any different around me, if you want something all you have to do is ask me"

He looked across the room the room at me with bright brown eyes, he grinned at me and I smiled back

"Really, cause I'm super hungry" he said clutching his stomach

I had to stifle back a laugh "Mom said that she was making a stop for breakfast"

"Thank goodness" he said throwing his head back

XOXOXOXOXOXO

It was rare event when one of my parents would drop me off to school. I was always the first to leave the house, rain or shine I would always catch the bus. But with my cast on, my mom didn't want to take the chance of my injuring myself again

After making a stop at the closest fast food pace to grab something for breakfast, we were off to take Juno to school. He attended Fiore Primary school, it was closer to the idle of the city were majority of the business were established. Pulling up to the front of the school, the teachers assistant, a blue haired woman named was there attending to the arriving students as she greeted the parents with that warm teacherly smile. Saying his goodbye, Juno hoped out of the car and ran up to the lady, she beamed down at him and then looked over to where we were parked, she smiled and waved at us, and I waved back before my mother pulled off

As my mother zoomed off and turned the next tight right the car was dead silent. The radio was on but turned down to the point where you could hear little bits and pieces of what the people were saying. As she made another turn, my mother cleared her throat

"Um, listen Tomo" she started "I know that this may be a challenge…"

I was staring out the window as she spoke, but as those words left her mouth I turned and looked at her "What challenge?"

"I mean, going back to school after..." her eyes flickered for a moment before she spoke "that incident"

"Oh…yeah" I responded continuing to stare out the window

"And I realized that the transition back to everything, will take some time. What I'm saying is, if you have a problem or feel like there's something that we need to talk about, you know that you can come to me,right" she made the next left and the car drifted a little too close to the side walk for comfort

"…."

"Tomo?"

"Yeah"

Did you hear what I—"

"Yes, I heard you"

My voice came out harsher then I meant it to, the look on my mom's face told me that she had taken it that way too. It wasn't that I didn't understand what she was trying to do, but all the length strung wires that I had attached between my parents and myself weren't going to be disconnected by one moment of parental affection.

She turned her attention back on the road and her face had a stale expression on it. I sighed and reached for the radio and turned it up partially, anything was better than this awkward silence that lingered in the car. For the rest of the way the only sound in the car that could be heard was the morning talk show host rant about the lasts celebrity scandal. Pulling up to MPA gate, I unlatched myself from my seat belt and through my bag over my shoulder, grabbing my crutch I opened the door when my mom spoke out

"We set up for you to meet with your school nurse to have you bandages changed daily"

Grunting in response, I closed the door behind me and my mother soon speed off. When she was out of sight, I let out the breath that I hadn't realized that I was holding in. Something about being back here so soon set my scars to burning, scratching at them from above my clothing only soothed them for a minute.

Using my crutch and making my way into school, I was instantly met with starts and whispers. People would look at me for moment and then turn to the person next to them and gossip something. The people that walked around me would look back before returning to their business

"_I already expected this"_ I thought as I crutched my way over to the court yard. As I made my way over, I looked around; everything seemed to be normal, I was expecting people to be in shock or at least slightly devastated; that just goes to show you to never undermine the teenage resilience

"Tomo!"

I looked over and saw Chelia standing up and waving at me. Smiling, I walked over and saw that she was sitting with Lina, Orie, Nobu, and Noah he was one of the sophomore basketball players and Lina's current play thing. Grunting as I eased myself onto he empty space to next to Chelia, I placed my crutch and bag on the table

"Hey!" Noah barked as the crutch swung across the table almost knocking him in the face "Watch what you do with that thing"

"My bad" I muttered adjusting the crutch

"Guess what?" Chelia grinned evilly as she pushed her self-close to me

"I don't really care but I have a feeling you're going to tell me anyway"

"You sir" she said pointing an imposing finger in my face "Have topped the school's "Hit" lists."

"And the "Hit" list is, what exactly" Noah asked looking confused

Lina placed a comforting hand on his shoulder and gave him a look that said, _stop asking so many questions_.

"The "Hit" list, is what we call the talk of the school list" she explained

"Basically, it's the gossip chain, so to speak" Nobu said explaining it simply

"And why am I the talk of the town"

"School" Chelia corrected "But, everyone thought that you wouldn't be coming to school anytime soon, and can I go on the record as saying that having them make us come back to school so soon after" she tried to phase it right "That" all happened."

"And people thought you were died" Orie added "So you're like a walking ghost'

"Great" I muttered rolling my eyes

The bell rung and we all groaned

"Uh, time for one of Mrs. Genevive's raving tiles about the 1820's" Orie said leaning into Nobu who grinned and stroked his girlfriend's head in response

Watching those two had always given me a strange feeling, not the feeling of how they were still together but more of jealous feeling, not that I would ever tell them that

"Come on" he said grabbing her bag and pulling her up as she groaned

Getting up from my seat and swinging my leg around, I was about to grab my stuff when someone waked past me roughly bumping me in the shoulder. The attack had caught me off guard causing me to stumble backwards, using the table as a buffer I caught myself with ease

"Hey" I grumbled at the person "watch it"

"What was that?" The voice turned around and I was met with beady little eyes. Zancrow sneered looking me up and down, his eyes landed on my casted foot and he chuckled. His chuckled sent a cold shiver shooting down my back

"Nice fashion accessory" he grinned evilly "Might have to give you a matching set. Now, what was it that you just said to me?"

The world seemed to stop for a minute as he started me down, people walking about stopped and looked at the scene that was unfolding in front of them. It was as if he was staring deeply into my soul, which I know sounds cliché, but those eyes of his were just the creepiest thing ever

"I said, watch were you're going"

I wondered who had said that, it only took a minute from the reaction of the audience that I realized that those words had come from my mouth. Zancrow looked at me surprised, which to say I was surprised. Zancrow's shocked expression only lasted for a minute before it was replaced with a sadistic grin

"So, think that since you can survive fire, that you can survive me" he said taking a step closer to me "Listen, I'm already in a fucking bad mood, the last thing I need is some stupid dip shit, who thinks he has the freaking pair to mess with me and another thing—"each time he spoke he would take a step closer to me, and he was seriously taking up my personal space

"Enough" a feminine voice chimed in

We all turned to see Angel walking up to us, she was wearing a top that left little to the imagination,

"What was that?" Zancrow said turning his gaze to her

"I said enough" she responded flinging her light colored hair over her shoulder "The bell rung for class and if you're late again, you know as well as I do what happen" she glanced in my direction

"And picking a fight with a cripple, that's weak even for you"

Zancrow growled at her before taking a step back from me. Giving a thankful sigh to the great people above, he turned back to me and squinted those evil looking eyes at me before accusing finger in my face

"This isn't over" that was the last thing he said before turning and running to catch up with Angel. I could feel time start moving again as everyone scattered away from the scene, my back slid across the table, its obtuse edges digging into my skin. Reaching behind me for my crutch, I grabbed my bag and limped my way over to where my friends were standing

"OMG, I thought he was going to kill you" Chelia said

"Yeah" I mumbled to myself

"Hey, look at it like this" Noah said placing a comforting hand on my shoulder "Nothing worse can happen to you, then what has already happened"

I took me a minute to comprehend what he had just said "Thanks, I think"

The warning bell rung signaling that we only had one more minute to get to class

'Ugh" Lina groaned grabbing Noah's hand "Come on, I'll see you guys later" she drug Noah off with her

"Yeah, we got to go too" Orie said stating to walk off with Nobu "I'll see you in dance class" she said nodding in my direction.

"Sooo' Chelia began "Is this one of those times that I can use you to my advantage or, are you going to be a spoilsport about the situation?"

"What do you think?"

She sighed and took a step away from me "Fine, but if you need anything I'm a text away" She said waving her phone through the air

"Yeah"

Chelia walked off and I stood there for a moment trying to catch my thought, but for some reason my brain didn't want to respond to anything that I was trying to access (Talk about mental block)

Making my way over to speech class, I stood in front of the door as the bell sounded off. I was late anyway but surely, Mr. Forest, whose real name was Fredrick but we called him that because he had the body of a tree, thick and bushy. It didn't help that he was of Irish decent so he also had this really weird accent, which is kind of funny when you think about it.

Reaching the door I drew in a breath before twisting the knob and pushing it open. All eyes flew in my direction as I closed the door behind me

"Ah, Mr. Brackendale nice of you to join us" Mr. Forest gave me a big grin which was kind of hard to see with his long beard being in the way

"Yeah" eyes continued to trial me as I made my way over to my seat. The room was dead silent besides the sound of the wall clock ticking and my crutches scratching against the floor. Finally reaching my seat I pulled the chair out and winced as it squeaked but took my seat.

"Alright class, let's talk about pronunciation" he wrote it out on the board

For the first time that day, the attention that people were paying me seemed to disappear as they were trying their best to ignore the lecture. And I couldn't have been happier

* * *

I've never had a cast myself but I've heard that they have mixed reviews (shrugs shoulders)

PS. In the next chapter, Tomo and Laxus will have there very first (speaking) interaction! Trust me when I say it's going to be good.

But R&R on what you think, honestly


End file.
